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BOOKS    BY    ELIZA    CHESTER. 
(HARRIET  E.    PAINE.) 


Chats  with  Girls  on  Self-Culture 

AND 

The  Unmarried  Woman. 


Each  izmo.    $1.25. 


THE  PORTIA  SERIES 


CHATS  WITH   GIRLS         ^^"^ 


ON 


SELF-CULTURE 


BY 


ELIZA   CHESTER 

AUTHOR   OF  "GIRLS   AND   WOMEN 


NEW     YORK 

DODD,   MEAD,   AND   COMPANY 
1897 


-m^ 


Copyright,  t89l. 
By  Dodd,  Mead,  and  Company. 


AU  rights  reurved 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGR 

I.    What  is  Self-Culture? i 

II.    A  Word  about  the  Body i8 

III.  How  shall  we  learn  to  Observe    .    .  23 

IV.  How  shall  we  learn  to  Remember?    .  38 
V.    How  shall  we  learn  to  Think  ? .    .    .  54 

VI.    The  Study  of  Languages 64 

VII.    The    Cultivation    of    the     Love    of 

Beauty 75 

VIII.      How   SHALL  WE   READ? 95 

IX.    What  shall  we  Read? io6 

X.    Travel "4 

XI.    The  Cultivation  of  a  Sense  of  Humour  125 

XII.    Dull  Girls 129 

XIII.  Clever  Girls ••••143 

XIV.  Moral  Culture i53 

XV.    The  Training  of  the  Will 161 

XVI.    Justice  and  Truth  . 171 

XVII.    A  Spirit  of  Love 182 

XVIII.    The  Choice  of  Companions i97 

XIX.    The    Meaning    of    our    Culture    to 

Others 206 


CHATS   WITH    GIRLS   ON 
SELF-CULTURE. 


I. 

WHAT   IS  SELF-CULTURE? 

ONE  summer  morning,  long  ago,  I  sat  in  a  pleasant 
schoolroom  and  listened  while  a  group  of  fine 
young  girls  in  fresh,  white  dresses  read  their  gradu- 
ating compositions.  One  of  them,  whose  eyes  were 
clear  and  whose  voice  was  earnest,  had  chosen  as  her 
subject  the  words  of  Jean  Paul,  —  **  I  have  made  of  my- 
self all  that  could  be  made  of  the  stuff."  I  have  for- 
gotten her  composition ;  but  I  think  it  must  have  been 
forcible,  since  after  all  these  years  I  remember  her  dig- 
nity of  bearing,  and  the  impression  of  her  motto  has 
never  been  lost.  It  seems  to  me  a  worthy  introduction 
to  the  subject  of  Self-Culture. 

Self-Culture  is  the  education  which  we  give  ourselves, 
or  in  other  words,  the  culture  of  ourselves  by  ourselves. 
We  have  all  kinds  of  material  to  work  upon,  and  some 
of  us  have  great  help  from  others  in  our  work,  but  we  all 
have  to  do  something.     Even  a  princess,  surrounded  by 


2         CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

teachers  from  the  moment  she  is  born,  cannot  be  cul- 
tivated without  doing  a  part  of  the  work. 

The  help  of  others  ought  to  be  a  blessing  to  us,  and 
it  is  so  in  the  case  of  real  help ;  but  so  much  that  is 
called  help  is  not  real,  that  those  who  are  forced  to  rely 
on  themselves  often  make  the  most  complete  men  and 
women.  Nevertheless  the  pronoun  I  is  apt  to  have  an 
unlovely  character.  Whoever  is  always  saying,  *'  I  did 
it,"  "  I  made  this  of  myself,"  etc.,  is  not  very  attractive. 
Those  who  have  no  culture  but  self-culture  are  so  in 
danger  of  being  one-sided  in  their  development,  that  it 
is  necessary  to  sound  a  note  of  warning  to  them  at  the 
very  beginning  of  this  little  book.  It  is  certainly  our 
duty  to  make  all  we  can  of  the  stuff.  We  can  often  do 
this  modestly  by  following  the  advice  of  our  parents  and 
teachers ;  but  when  we  are  called  upon  to  take  counsel 
of  ourselves  alone,  we  have  to  concentrate  our  attention 
so  much  on  ourselves  that  the  result  may  be  disastrous. 

**  Evelina's  conversation  is  rather  exhausting,"  said  a 
lively  young  teacher.  "  On  the  train  she  explains  the 
action  of  the  engine,  beginning  with  the  fire  under  the 
boiler,  and  never  stopping  till  the  steam  has  passed  off 
into  space.  Coming  home  from  a  concert  she  lets  no 
one  rest  till  she  has  pointed  out  all  the  visible  constella- 
tions. At  Plymouth  the  other  day  she  insisted  on 
relating  the  entire  history  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  —  that 
is,  so  far  as  she  knows  it ;  and  she  always  uses  French 


WHAT  IS   SELF-CULTURE?  3 

when  an  English  word  would  express  her  idea  better. 
Of  course  it  is  beautiful  that  she  is  so  devoted  to  her 
studies !  " 

Now  it  happened  that  Evelina  had  had  few  home 
advantages.  She  had  never  known  the  principle  of  the 
steam-engine  till  she  learned  it  in  a  book,  and  she  was 
delighted  to  find  she  understood  it.  Her  father  and 
mother  had  never  told  her  the  story  of  the  Pilgrim 
Fathers,  and  she  naturally  supposed  it  would  be  new  to 
other  people.  As  for  French,  she  thought  that  only 
practice  would  make  perfect,  without  realizing  that 
such  practice  as  hers  would  be  likely  to  make  her 
speech  all  the  more  imperfect.  She  was  a  well-disposed 
girl  with  a  good  mind.  She  would  sometime  be  edu- 
cated, so  far  as  information  goes,  and  perhaps  after  a 
time  she  would  see  that  education  is  something  more 
than  information. 

It  is  well  to  have  knowledge  at  our  command,  but  not 
always  well  to  inflict  it  upon  others,  especially  if  it  is  of 
a  kind  they  could  easily  acquire  for  themselves  if  they 
had  the  wish.  I  knew  a  teacher  so  determined  to  avoid 
pedantry  that  she  made  it  a  rule  never  to  correct  any 
mistake  made  by  others  outside  the  schoolroom. 
Indeed,  she  often  indulged  in  little  colloquial  errors 
herself,  saying  she  would  rather  be  ungrammatical  than 
disagreeable.  I  should  not  be  surprised  if  she  went  too 
far. 


4         CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

For  why  should  we  not  take  pleasure  in  telling  others 
the  things  we  know?  Is  it  not  amiable  to  do  so?  It 
is  amiable  to  tell  them  what  they  wish  to  know;  it  is 
even  occasionally  a  duty  to  tell  them  what  they  do  not 
wish  to  know;  but  it  is  never  either  amiable  or  a  duty 
to  tell  anything  simply  to  show  that  we  know  it.  The 
self-educated  are  most  in  danger  of  doing  this.  The 
girls  who  learn  from  cultured  mothers  and  fathers  by 
sharing  the  atmosphere  of  culture  are  not  so  likely  to 
"show  off"  their  acquisitions  as  those  to  whom  such 
acquisitions  are  less  a  matter  of  course. 

Culture  of  ourselves  is  an  even  more  important  part 
of  self-culture  than  culture  by  ourselves.  We  must  be 
glad  of  all  the  advantages  of  home  and  school,  of  friends 
and  society  and  travel,  which  come  to  us  without  our 
own  effort,  and  then  we  must  make  the  most  of  all 
these. 

But  why  do  we  wish  to  cultivate  ourselves?  Perhaps 
many  motives  are  at  work  in  us.  It  may  be  that  some 
girl  who  takes  up  this  book  is  smarting  with  a  sense  of 
injustice.  She  feels  that  she  is  looked  down  upon  by 
those  who  are  not  her  superiors.  She  has  heard  that 
knowledge  is  power.  She  has  no  one  to  help  her,  but 
she  wants  to  learn  how  to  help  herself  that  she  may  win 
her  way  to  a  higher  position  in  life.  Well,  the  motive  is 
not  altogether  bad,  and  yet  it  is  not  a  noble  one.  I  hope 
that  every  such  girl  will  win  her  way,  but  I  hope  that  her 


WHAT  IS   SELF-CULTURE?  5 

object  in  trying  to  cultivate  herself  will  not  be  what  is 
generally  called  success. 

A  great  deal  of  self-culture  comes  from  a  desire  to 
make  an  impression  on  others.  This  is  especially  sc 
with  women  because  in  them  approbativeness  is  large. 
But  what  an  unworthy  motive  ! 

Some  think  of  culture  as  a  means  of  increasing  the 
sources  of  happiness.  This  is  right.  We  are  happier 
when  we  have  the  full  use  of  our  powers.  There  is 
a  never-failing  glory  and  exhilaration  in  thinking  new 
thoughts  and  discovering  new  truth  which  makes  us 
happy  in  poverty,  obscurity,  neglect,  and  pain.  Age 
does  not  dull  the  keenness  of  this  pleasure.  Young  peo- 
ple are  sometimes  impatient  because  there  is  so  much  to 
learn,  and  the  girls  for  whom  I  write  may  not  realize  that 
what  I  say  is  anything  more  than  mere  words ;  but  it  is 
true  that  those  who  love  the  things  of  the  intellect  unsel- 
fishly find  surprises  of  splendour  waiting  for  them  all 
along  their  pathway  to  the  very  end. 

Sometimes  the  motive  for  self-culture  is  the  hope  of 
being  of  use  to  others.  This  is  so  lofty  that  I  wish  it 
were  common ;  but  it  is  very  rare. 

I  believe  the  true  reason  why  we  should  wish  to  be  all 
we  may  be  is  because  the  power  to  become  so  is  put  into 
our  own  hands.  This  is  the  Httle  garden-plot  which  we 
have  had  given  us  to  beautify.  If  we  neglect  it,  there  will 
always  be  one  blot  on  the  universe. 


6         CHATS  WITH  GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

It  would  still  be  our  privilege  as  well  as  our  duty  to 
"make  the  most  of  the  stuff"  if  we  were  cast  away  on  a 
solitary  island  and  knew  we  were  never  more  to  see  a 
human  being.  If  we  had  any  nobleness  in  us,  we  should 
still  wish  to  keep  our  bodies  clean  and  sweet ;  we  should 
still  wish  to  think  and  feel  truly  though  we  could  no 
longer  tell  the  truth ;  and  to  hold  ourselves  in  the  attitude 
of  love  though  there  was  no  one  of  our  race  to  whom  we 
could  express  our  love.  We  could  still  love  God  and  the 
humble  creatures  around  us ;  but  more  than  that,  our 
hearts  could  go  out  to  those  we  should  never  see.  If  it 
were  not  so,  if  we  failed  here,  we  should  also  fail  when 
living  in  the  world. 

Self-culture  is  never  wholly  for  ourselves.  Intellectual 
and  physical  culture  may  in  a  selfish  person  end  with  the 
individual,  though  even  this  is  seldom  true ;  but  moral 
culture  cannot  possibly  end  with  self. 

What  is  the  end  of  self-culture  ? 

Perhaps  we  may  turn  to  our  catechism  for  the  answer,  — 
*'  What  is  the  chief  end  of  man  ?  To  glorify  God,  and 
serve  and  enjoy  Him  forever."  But  this  is  a  general 
though  a  sublime  answer,  and  we  must  have  definite  aims 
if  we  wish  to  bring  our  daily  life  into  harmony  with  our 
highest  conceptions. 

What  kind  of  women  do  we  wish  to  be? 

A  great  deal  depends  on  the  answer  to  this  question. 
I  suppose  that  the  girls  who  are  most  likely  to  read  a 


WHAT  IS  SELF-CULTURE?  7 

book  on  self-culture  are  those  who  have  an  intellectual 
bent.  Their  first  thought  —  at  least  in  reading  such  a 
book  —  is  how  they  shall  make  the  most  of  their  minds. 
And  yet  how  few  of  them,  if  they  stop  to  think,  would 
be  satisfied  to  be  simply  intellectual  women  ! 

I  remember  a  girl  who  had  an  insatiable  thirst  for 
knowledge  and  a  mind  of  wonderful  power.  She  had 
germs  of  a  noble  character.  She  was  upright  and  just. 
Terrible  trouble  came  to  her  when  she  was  very  young. 
She  had  a  desperate  struggle  with  poverty,  and  the  whole 
care  of  a  chronic  invalid  fell  on  her  delicate  shoulders. 
She  did  her  duty  faithfully ;  she  fought  her  way  through 
frightful  obstacles ;  she  gained  a  thorough  education,  and 
became  at  last  a  learned  woman.  On  the  day  when  the 
news  of  the  taking  of  Richmond  roused  the  whole  coun- 
try, an  enthusiastic  friend  rushed  in  upon  her  with  the 
cry,  "  The  war  is  over  !  Lee  has  surrendered  !  "  "  Has 
he?"  replied  the  young  girl,  indifferently ;  ^'well,  lam 
more  interested  in  this  new  Hebrew  grammar  than  in 
the  war  ! "  There  was  so  much  that  was  heroic  in  her 
nature  that  she  inspired  respect ;  but  it  was  always  sad 
to  see  her,  not  only  because  her  circumstances  were  so 
hard,  but  because  she  missed  so  many  of  the  best 
things  of  life. 

I  heard  not  long  ago  of  a  fine  young  fellow  who  asked, 
"  After  all,  why  do  we  care  so  much  for  culture  when 
it  only  separates  us  from  our  kind  ?  "     Certain  forms  of 


8         CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

culture  do  separate  us  from  our  kind ;  perhaps  most  of 
what  is  commonly  called  culture  does  this,  but  is  that 
the  culture  we  are  striving  for?     I  hope  not. 

Irma,  the  heroine  of  Auerbach's  great  novel,  *'  On 
the  Heights,"  writes  in  her  journal :  "  That  is  the  point 
why  our  modern  culture  cannot  take  the  place  of  re- 
ligion ;  religion  makes  all  men  equal ;  culture,  unequal. 
There  must,  however,  some  day  be  a  system  of  culture 
which  will  make  all  men  equal ;  then  only  will  it  be  the 
right  and  true.     We  are  yet  only  at  the  beginning." 

Shall  I  not  describe  to  the  girls  who  are  to  read  this 
book  the  kind  of  woman  I  believe  they  wish  to  be? 

They  wish  to  be  as  strong  and  beautiful  physically  as 
is  possible  with  the  bodies  which  have  been  given 
them;  they  wish  to  be  clear-sighted  and  intelligent; 
they  wish  for  wide  knowledge,  —  not  to  exhibit  it,  but 
to  use  it ;  they  wish  to  make  their  accomplishments  a 
means  of  expressing  beauty  in  their  every-day  lives ;  to 
be  refined  in  manner  and  still  more  refined  in  feeling ; 
and,  above  all,  to  be  sweet,  fresh,  truthful,  modest,  and  — 
again,  above  all  —  large-hearted  women. 

It  is  not  my  province  to  say  much  of  physical  culture, 
but  a  girl  who  neglects  it  does  so  at  her  peril.  Without 
it  she  will  not  only  suffer  bodily,  but  she  can  never  be 
mentally  or  morally  what  she  was  meant  to  be. 

Intellectually,  it  is  best  to  lay  broad  foundations.  I 
once  heard  of  a  young  girl  who  studied  Latin  two  weeks. 


WHAT  IS  SELF-CULTURE?  9 

She  said  she  just  wanted  to  get  an  insight  into  it.  I 
do  not  think  she  had  a  keen  sense  of  humour.  She  was 
laughed  at  by  other  people ;  but  I  have  sometimes  won- 
dered whether  her  study  was  necessarily  in  vain.  If 
she  fancied  she  knew  anything  of  Latin,  then  she  was 
superficial ;  but  in  two  weeks  an  average  scholar  might 
easily  learn  something  of  the  way  Latin  differs  from  Eng- 
lish, and  might  in  consequence  look  at  many  problems  of 
language  and  literature,  and  even  of  history,  more  wisely. 

A  slight  knowledge  of  a  subject  is  not  always  a  super- 
ficial knowledge.  A  lady  who  was  a  botanist  spent  an 
afternoon  in  explaining  to  a  friend  something  of  the 
structure  of  mosses,  showing  her  especially  how  the 
whole  kingdom  of  these  exquisite  little  plants  is  domi- 
nated by  the  plan  of  four.  "  Oh,"  cried  the  enthusiastic 
listener,  "  I  feel  as  if  I  had  had  a  glimpse  into  a  new 
world  !  "  One  afternoon  could  not  make  the  student  a 
botanist,  but  it  could  give  her  large  thoughts  about 
plants. 

I  once  heard  a  young  girl  give  a  reason  for  wishing  to 
graduate  from  a  good  school,  though  she  was  poor,  and 
sacrifices  were  required  to  keep  her  there  for  the  last 
few  months.  "  I  know  well  enough,"  she  said,  "  that 
another  term  in  school  will  not  '  complete  my  educa- 
tion ; '  but  I  have  always  thought  I  should  like  to  take  a 
full  course  of  study  and  know  a  little  of  all  the  sub- 
jects which  the   older   and  wiser  people  who  planned 


lO       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

the  course  considered  a  necessary  foundation  for  an 
education." 

This  careful  laying  of  a  symmetrical  foundation  is  not 
like  the  feverish  rushing  from  one  thing  to  another 
which  characterizes  so  many  girls.  "  I  am  too  busy  to 
go  to  see  you,"  said  a  friend  on  the  street  not  long  ago. 
"  It  is  because  I  have  my  living  to  earn,  and  not  be- 
cause I  am  tearing  round  like  mad  after  culture,  like 
everybody  else  in  Boston." 

And  now,  how  can  we  cultivate  ourselves?  It  is  the 
purpose  of  the  following  pages  to  make  some  practical 
suggestions  in  answer  to  this  question.  It  is  not  my  in- 
tention to  present  an  exhaustive  plan  of  self-culture,  yet 
I  have  wished  the  outline  of  this  little  book  to  be  some- 
what comprehensive,  because  I  feel  that  a  one-sided 
development  is  an  injury  to  any  one.  I  think  that  the 
cultivation  of  the  physical,  the  mental,  and  the  moral 
natures  should  go  hand  in  hand.  There  are  some  prin- 
ciples of  growth  which  may  be  applied  equally  to  all 
these  three  cases,  others  which  can  be  best  understood 
by  studying  them  in  connection  with  some  special  form 
of  culture. 

In  this  preliminary  chapter  I  will  speak  of  things 
essential  to  any  self-culture,  whether  of  the  body,  the 
mind,  or  the  heart. 

A  wise  normal-school  principal  was  accustomed  to 
begin  his  instructions  to  his  pupils  by  teUing  them  that 


WHAT  IS   SELF-CULTURE?  II 

the  first  requisite  in  getting  an  education  was  to  be 
teachable.  Nobody  can  help  a  scholar  whose  attitude  is 
that  of  self-sufficiency.  No  one  learns  from  even  the 
best  teacher  without  being  willing  to  learn.  Any  in- 
structor will  tell  you  that  when  a  class  is  made  up  of 
indifferent  scholars,  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  treat  the 
subject  of  the  lesson  in  the  most  interesting  way,  no 
matter  how  conscientiously  he  may  try.  On  the  other 
hand,  there  are  pupils  so  full  of  eagerness  to  be  taught 
that  even  a  commonplace  teacher  feels  a  glow  of  inspira- 
tion with  them,  and  thinks  of  a  thousand  new  illus- 
trations to  make  the  subject  clear.  "  I  always  enjoy 
any  class  when  Miss  Frost  is  in  it,"  said  a  teacher. 
"  She  is  not  brilliant,  but  she  is  so  interested  in  all  I  say, 
that  I  feel  like  saying  the  best  things."  I  have  heard  of 
a  lady  who  loved  poetry  who  would  never  teach  litera- 
ture to  her  pupils  because  they  were  so  unappreciative 
that  she  said  she  felt  as  if  it  would  desecrate  any  poem 
to  mention  it  to  them.  No  doubt  she  was  partly  to 
blame  herself,  but  you  see  how  each  one  may  be  in  a 
measure  responsible  for  what  others  give  to  her. 

Even  if  a  teacher's  ardour  were  not  influenced  at  all 
by  the  carelessness  of  the  listeners,  yet  no  one  will  learn 
who  is  not  willing  to  be  taught.  If  we  think  that  we 
know  already  everything  worth  knowing,  we  are  not 
likely  to  add  much  to  our  knowledge.  If  we  approach 
the  very  humblest  of  our  teachers  in  a  spirit  of  criticism, 


12       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

we  do  not  get  from  such  an  one  even  the  little  which 
might  be  given  us. 

Some  one  may  fancy  that  teachableness  is  not  neces- 
sary in  self-culture ;  but  it  is  more  important  for  those 
who  must  work  much  alone  than  for  others  who  have 
pastors  and  masters  appointed  them,  because  those  who 
have  few  to  help  them  are  most  in  danger  of  relying  on 
their  own  narrow  view  of  a  subject.  No  one  is  so  un- 
fortunate as  to  be  entirely  without  teachers.  At  the 
very  worst  we  can  still  turn  to  books  with  a  teachable 
spirit.  But  as  a  matter  of  fact,  any  one  who  is  teach- 
able can  usually  find  a  teacher,  though  not  always  in  the 
formal  sense  of  the  word.  For  instance,  an  ill-educated 
young  girl  thinks  she  would  like  to  speak  better  English, 
but  she  cannot  go  to  school.  Now,  she  probably  knows 
some  one  who  speaks  well.  Perhaps  it  is  her  rector,  or 
her  employer,  or  even  some  companion.  If  she  chooses 
to  pay  attention  to  this  friend's  manner  of  speech,  she 
is  sure  to  improve,  though  the  friend  may  be  quite  un- 
conscious of  giving  any  help.  Suppose  she  would  like 
to  know  something  of  literature,  but  cannot  buy  books. 
She  is  undoubtedly  acquainted  with  somebody  who 
would  be  glad  to  lend  her  a  volume  of  Shakspeare,  and 
until  she  has  learned  that  by  heart,  she  need  not  be 
troubled  by  her  narrow  surroundings. 

Most  of  us,  however,  arc  not  reduced  to  such  extrem- 
ities.    We  have  a  wealth  of  opportunity  to  choose  from  ; 


WHAT   IS   SELF-CULTURE?  13 

and  it  must  never  be  forgotten  that  those  who  have 
every  advantage  that  money  can  buy,  and  all  the  culti- 
vated friends  and  teachers  who  work  directly  and 
indirectly  in  their  behalf,  still  have  the  duty  of  self- 
culture  laid  upon  them  even  more  imperatively  than 
their  less  fortunate  fellow-creatures.  The  young  girl 
who  sits  through  a  classical  concert  with  the  utmost  pro- 
priety, but  who  spends  her  time  in  examining  the  bon- 
nets of  her  neighbours,  or  in  thinking  over  the  last  party, 
gets  no  culture  from  the  music,  though  she  may  be  able 
to  discuss  the  performers,  and  say  that  the  soprano  had 
a  voice  like  a  steam-whistle,  and  that  the  piano  was  out 
of  tune.  A  poorer  girl  who  could  not  go  to  the  concert 
may  envy  her,  and  wish  that  she  too  were  a  connoisseur, 
but  that  is  simply  because  she  does  not  know  what  she  is 
envying.  Unless  we  use  our  opportunities,  we  have  not 
the  spirit  of  culture,  and  any  true  growth  is  impossible. 

Teachableness,  however,  is  not  the  only  quality  essen- 
tial to  self-culture.  We  must  know  how  to  choose  our 
teachers.  That  means  that  we  must  be  self-reliant,  — 
and  for  a  moment  some  one  may  think  that  this  spirit 
is  exactly  opposed  to  teachableness ;  but  self-reliance  is 
not  self-sufficiency. 

We  are  not  all  capable  of  choosing  the  best  teachers. 
A  little  child,  for  example,  has  not  much  judgment. 
Some  of  us  never  can  depend  on  our  own  judgment.     It 


14       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

is  right  that  we  should  be  modest.  If  we  have  good 
reason  to  think  that  one  of  our  friends  is  wiser  than  we 
are,  we  must  take  counsel  of  that  friend.  Nevertheless, 
if  we  cannot  choose  our  teachers  well,  it  may  sometimes 
be  a  positive  disadvantage  to  us  to  be  teachable.  To 
illustrate  :  there  was  once  a  young  girl  with  a  great  musi- 
cal endowment.  She  lived  in  a  village  where  there  was 
little  musical  culture.  She  took  some  lessons  of  an 
agreeable  young  lady  who  was  considered  the  best  musi- 
cian in  the  place.  By  and  by  she  found  her  voice  failing 
unaccountably.  She  decided  to  go  away  to  a  distant  city 
and  study  with  a  distinguished  master.  The  master  told 
her  that  all  she  had  hitherto  learned  was  a  hindrance 
rather  than  a  help  to  her,  for  her  teacher  had  not  under- 
stood the  need  of  correct  breathing,  and  she  had  formed 
bad  habits.  The  young  girl  went  to  work  with  a  will  to 
overcome  her  faults ;  but  after  she  had  been  struggling  a 
long  time,  her  master  told  her  one  day  very  gently  that 
he  had  never  had  a  pupil  whose  faults  were  so  ingrained, 
and  who  would  require  so  much  time  to  eradicate  them. 
"  If  you  had  not  been  so  determined  to  do  your  best, 
and  to  follow  your  teacher's  directions  exactly,"  he  said, 
"  you  would  never  have  learned  these  false  ways  so 
thoroughly  !  "  Then  they  both  laughed,  but  the  pupil 
could  not  help  crying  at  the  same  time.  **  Suppose  I 
should  be  making  the  same  kind  of  a  mistake  again  ?  " 
she   said  roguishly.      *'Sure   enough,"  said  the  master. 


WHAT  IS  SELF-CULTURE?  15 

"  Well,  think  the  matter  over,  and  see  if  you  can*t  decide 
for  yourself  whether  to  follow  my  directions."  She 
thought  for  a  while  and  then  said,  "  When  I  was  at  home, 
I  always  felt  tired  after  a  lesson,  and  I  grew  more  and 
more  tired  as  time  went  on ;  but  with  you  I  find  it  is 
easier  and  easier  to  use  my  voice.  So  I  think  I  shall  risk 
doing  exactly  as  you  tell  me." 

Every  one  of  us  must  love  the  girl  better  for  her  faith 
in  her  first  teacher  and  her  zeal  in  obeying  her.  She 
certainly  gained  in  moral  culture  by  her  docility,  for  she 
had  chosen  the  teacher  she  believed  to  be  best.  Still 
her  want  of  discrimination  had  involved  a  great  loss 
musically.  In  this  case  it  was  inevitable.  No  one  could 
expect  a  young  girl  under  the  circumstances  to  do  better. 

I  have  before  said  that  we  could  not  get  the  best 
which  even  the  humblest  could  give  us  by  approaching 
the  teacher  in  a  spirit  of  criticism ;  and  yet  we  must 
exercise  some  criticism  or  we  shall  always  be  following 
blind  guides.  How  can  we  reconcile  these  two  facts? 
It  seems  to  me  we  must  choose  the  teacher  we  believe 
to  be  best  and  then  give  him  a  fair  chance.  If  he  tries 
to  explain  something  to  us,  let  us  try  to  understand, 
instead  of  wondering  if  some  one  else  could  not  do  bet- 
ter. When  he  has  done  all  he  can,  and  we  have  done  all 
we  can,  and  still  we  have  not  mastered  the  difficulty,  we 
must  seek  for  another  teacher.  We  must,  however,  be 
modest  enough  to  acknowledge  that  the  fault  may  be  in  us. 


1 6       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

Yet  it  may  be  in  the  teacher.  Perhaps  you  may  say  that 
this  was  substantially  what  our  little  singer  did,  and  that 
she  suffered  in  consequence.  That  is  true.  It  is  not  given 
to  most  of  us  to  learn  our  lessons  without  suffering.  But 
her  docility  proved  a  gain  in  the  end.  For  though  it  took 
her  so  long  to  conquer  her  faults  that  many  a  fellow- 
student  less  highly  endowed  outstripped  her  at  first,  yet 
her  habit  of  persevering  work  enabled  her  to  overcome 
at  last;  and  then  this  same  habit  gave  her  the  power 
to  learn  true  methods  of  singing  with  the  same  thorough- 
ness, so  in  the  end  she  did  make  of  her  superb  voice  "  all 
that  could  be  made  of  the  stuff."  A  friend  of  hers  who 
took  life  very  easily,  and  who  practised  or  not  according  to 
the  mood,  seemed  for  some  years  to  be  a  much  more 
successful  musician ;  but  her  careless  habits  always  went 
with  her,  and  she  never  became  really  great. 

We  do  want  the  best  teachers  in  everything.  It  is  a 
very  delicate  matter  to  know  how  to  choose  them ;  but 
the  first  essential  is  to  desire  the  best.  Our  power  of 
choosing  is  the  measure  of  the  degree  of  culture  we  have 
reached.  Of  course  those  of  us  who  have  had  few  ad- 
vantages will  make  a  great  many  mistakes ;  but  there  is 
one  direction  in  which  we  need  not  make  mistakes.  We 
always  win  a  moral  victory  when  we  try  to  do  the  best, 
even  if  we  are  mistaken  in  what  we  do. 

There  must  be  many  girls  who  have  already  realized 
that  in  every  effort  to  nourish  the  moral  nature  there  is 


WHAT  IS   SELF-CULTURE?  1 7 

unbounded  help  from  an  unseen  power.  There  must  be 
many  who  are  surprised  to  find  so  much  help  when  their 
own  efforts  are  so  weak  and  few.  If  there  are  some  who 
do  not  yet  know  this  truth  from  their  own  experience,  I 
cannot  prove  it  to  them.  But  we  can  all  prove  it  to 
ourselves,  by  making  such  an  effort ;  for  then  we  always 
touch  a  chord  which  vibrates  through  the  whole  universe. 
The  help  waiting  for  us  is  so  mighty  that  our  feeblest 
aspiration  is  never  without  a  response. 


II. 

A  WORD   ABOUT   THE   BODY. 

THE  girls  who  are  willing  to  read  a  volume  on  Self- 
culture  are  the  very  ones  most  likely  to  need 
bodily  culture.  Yet  I  shall  not  say  much  about  it  here, 
partly  because  other  volumes  of  this  series  deal  with  it 
more  fully,  and  partly  because  special  training  is  often 
needed  to  counteract  special  defects,  and  this  calls  for  a 
physician  or  a  gymnast. 

I  cannot  omit  the  subject  altogether,  however,  for  it  is 
of  vital  importance  ;  at  least,  it  is  necessary  to  be  well. 
Moral  culture,  it  is  true,  is  possible,  though  difficult,  for 
the  most  helpless  invalid ;  but  intellectual  labour  de- 
mands a  sound  body.  A  girl  who  knows  she  is  injuring 
her  health  by  study  must  be  willing  to  restrain  her 
ardour ;  if  not,  she  will  become  a  burden  to  herself  and 
to  everybody  else,  to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that  she 
will  not  even  accomplish  her  object.  It  would  be  a 
good  plan,  however,  for  her  to  make  sure  that  it  is  work 
which  is  hurting  her.  I  do  not  thuik  young  people 
often  over-study;  but   many   schoa -girls    are    careless 


A  WORD  ABOUT  THE  BODY.  1 9 

about  taking  proper  food  or  exercise  or  fresh  air;  and 
many  more  ruin  their  health  by  parties  and  late  hours ; 
while  there  is,  alas  !  a  large  class  who  study  selfishly, 
from  ambition  alone,  who  worry  so  much  over  their 
lessons  that  every  one  takes  it  for  granted  that  the 
lessons  themselves  are  injurious.  If  you  study  with  the 
true  aim  of  making  "  the  most  of  the  stuff,"  it  is  easy 
to  be  serene,  even  when  the  stuff  proves  cotton  instead 
of  silk ;  or,  to  drop  the  metaphor,  when  you  find  that 
your  faithful  efforts  still  leave  you  at  the  foot  of  your 
class.  If  you  mean  to  make  the  most  of  yourself,  it  will 
be  easy,  too,  to  give  the  body  its  due  share  of  attention. 

Those  of  us  who  are  bom  invalids  must  bear  our 
cross  patiently,  but  those  of  us  who  begin  life  well  are 
usually  to  blame  if  we  do  not  continue  to  be  well. 

I  must  insert  a  word  here  for  the  sake  of  the  poor 
girls  who  have  but  a  limited  time  to  study,  and  who 
believe  that  if  in  that  time  they  fail  to  gain  a  diploma, 
or  to  set  some  other  definite  seal  upon  their  work,  it 
may  change  their  whole  course  of  life.  Their  tempta- 
tion is  great.  With  care  in  other  directions,  they  may 
be  able  to  study  as  much  as  they  hope  to  do;  but  if 
not,  still  it  will  not  do  to  give  up  health.  It  would  be 
better  to  work  in  a  factory  all  one's  days  with  a  healthy 
body,  and  the  sunny  spirit  which  is  apt  to  accompany  it, 
with  a  love  for  books  and  a  determination  to  make  the 
most  of  spare  minutes,  than  to  take  honours  at  college, 


20       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

and  then,  breaking  down,  to  become  a  querulous  invalid 
for  the  rest  of  one's  days,  —  though  I  do  not  mean  that 
I  look  on  a  factory  life  as  either  agreeable  or  healthful 
in  itself. 

As  most  of  us  cannot  be  even  well  without  care,  the 
preservation  of  health  certainly  forms  a  part  of  the  sub- 
ject of  physical  culture ;  but  from  culture,  in  its  strict 
sense,  we  always  hope  for  improvement.  Can  we  im- 
prove our  bodies,  or  must  we  accept  them  exactly  as 
they  are  given  to  us?  I  am  inclined  to  think  the  body 
can  be  improved.  The  great  trouble  is,  that  after  we  - 
reach  full  maturity  physical  change  is  almost  impossible ; 
and  where  are  the  old  heads  on  very  young  shoulders 
necessary  if  there  is  to  be  any  improvement  in  early 
youth?  Luckily,  there  are  often  parents  and  teachers 
at  hand  to  guide,  and  docility  is  a  virtue  generally 
admitted  to  be  a  peculiar  ornament  of  a  young  girl. 

Moreover,  some  change  is  possible  even  for  older 
people ;  probably  more  than  we  think,  if  we  only  had 
the  heart  to  try  for  it.  For  instance,  statistics  show  that 
the  brain  measurements  of  the  uneducated  do  not  in- 
crease after  the  age  of  twenty-one,  yet  they  do  so  per- 
ceptibly among  college  students.  If  exercise  can  affect 
the  brain,  why  not  other  parts  of  the  body  ? 

I  know  a  child  of  five  years  who  has  some  symptoms 
of  lung  disease.  She  already  takes  an  intelligent  interest 
in  daily  practising  light  gymnastics  for  the  expansion  of 


A  WORD  ABOUT  THE  BODY.  21 

the  chest,  and  in  breathing  long  draughts  of  fresh  air. 
She  may  not  conquer  her  constitutional  tendency,  but 
I  think  she  will.  There  is  Uttle  doubt,  so  physicians 
are  beginning  to  say,  that  many  an  older  person  who  is 
believed  to  be  doomed  to  consumption  might  ward  off 
the  terrible  disease  by  proper  breathing  and  a  carefully 
regulated  diet. 

Those  of  us  who  have  studied  the  rudiments  of  physi- 
ology know  in  a  general  way  that  we  must  keep  the 
digestive  organs  in  good  order  by  food  of  the  right  kind 
and  amount;  that  we  shall  thus  be  supplied  with  good 
blood,  provided  we  always  breathe  enough  pure  air ;  and 
that  plenty  of  exercise  will  keep  our  muscles  vigorous. 
But  most  of  us  have  some  weakness  in  our  constitution, 
and  we  always  count  on  that  to  interfere  with  all  our 
plans.  We  need  to  find  out  our  particular  defect,  and 
try  to  cure  it.  Sometimes  we  can  do  that  for  ourselves. 
I  know  a  man  of  splendid  physique  who  was  a  narrow- 
chested  boy.  He  says  that  he  brought  about  the 
change  by  simply  throwing  his  shoulders  back  slowly  and 
forcibly  a  few  times  every  day  for  several  years. 

Our  defect,  however,  is  often  of  such  a  nature  that  we 
need  help  to  cure  it ;  probably  the  services  of  a  physician 
are  seldom  required.  The  gymnasium  would  often  be 
sufficient  if  the  teacher  could  make  an  individual  study 
of  each  case.  Just  what  can  be  done,  I  must  not 
venture  to  say ;  but  certainly  it  is  not  our  duty  to  be 


22       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

resigned  to  any  flaw  in  our  body  until  we  have  faith- 
fully tried  to  mend  it. 

Manual  training  is  fast  becoming  a  part  of  regular 
school  discipline ;  and  those  of  us  who  must  train  our- 
selves should  remember  that  if  we  would  be  of  use  in 
the  world,  we  need  useful  hands,  and  that  if  we  wish  to 
help  in  making  the  world  beautiful  we  must  have  accu- 
rate hands.  It  is  hard  to  teach  ourselves,  but  we  can 
demand  nice  and  complete  work  of  ourselves  in  what- 
ever we  do,  even  if  we  simply  have  beds  to  make  or 
dishes  to  wash.  I  was  pained  not  long  ago  to  see  a 
young  girl  who  had  a  genuine  love  of  beautiful  pictures 
turning  over  the  leaves  of  a  fine  book  of  photographs 
with  such  careless  hands  that  I  trembled  for  the  corners. 
I  think  the  rich  are  even  more  careless  than  the  poor  in 
such  ways ;  but  as  they  replace  their  soiled  and  battered 
treasures  more  frequently  with  something  new,  their 
faults  are  less  perceptible. 


III. 

HOW  SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO   OBSERVE? 

"  1\   /r  Y  girls  are  going  abroad  this  summer,'*  said  a 
1 VX     gentleman.     *'  Martha  will  see  everything,  and 

Mary  will  see  only  what  she  goes  to  see ;  but  then,  Mary 

will  know  best  what  she  wants  to  see." 

The  world  over  we  finti  this  distinction  between  the 

natural  observers  and  the  natural  thinkers.     When  the 

two  are  combined  we  have  genius. 

To  the  girls  who  see  everything  I  have  only  a  few 

words  to  say  at  this  point :  — 

1.  Take  pains  to  look  at  the  things  worth  seeing. 

2.  Take  time  to  think  about  what  you  see. 

Let  me  illustrate  these  rules  by  the  case  of  two  girls 
who  both  had  remarkable  powers  of  observation.  They 
were  visiting  a  friend  who  invited  them  to  take  a  drive. 
One  of  them  suggested  that  they  should  go  to  a  historic 
spot  in  the  vicinity  which  she  had  read  about.  The 
other  stipulated  that  they  should  drive  through  the  prin- 
cipal streets  of  the  city  on  their  way.  In  the  evening, 
while  talking  over  their  drive,  the  latter  electrified  every- 


24       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

body  by  appearing  to  know  who  lived  in  every  house 
they  had  passed.  She  had  observed  the  door-plates  and 
had  asked  questions.  She  remembered  who  lived  in 
the  brick  houses  with  bay  windows  and  in  the  stone 
mansions  with  porticos.  She  remembered  the  monu- 
ment they  had  visited,  too ;  but  her  interest  in  it  was 
languid,  and  her  ideas  of  the  event  it  celebrated 
confused. 

The  other  guest  remembered  the  houses  equally  well, 
but  she  had  not  noticed  whether  Mr.  Smith  or  Mr.  Jones 
lived  in  some  commonplace  structure.  On  the  other 
hand,  she  knew  the  historic  ground  inch  by  inch,  and 
slipping  away  to  the  library,  went  over  the  narrative 
again  while  the  details  were  fresh  in  her  mind. 

Both  these  girls  had  the  faculty  of  seeing  everything. 
One  of  them  used  it  as  a  means  of  culture  and  the  other 
did  not.  Most  persons,  even  among  those  who  are  con- 
sidered observing,  see  only  certain  things. 

I  once  heard  a  city  boy  say,  "  There  is  nothing  to  see 
in  the  country."  A  country  boy  of  about  the  same  age 
confided  to  me  his  opinion  that  there  was  nothing  to  see 
in  the  city. 

A  gentleman  and  lady,  both  enjoying  Nature,  were 
driving  through  the  woods  one  day  when  the  gentleman 
said,  **  What  an  eye  you  have  for  flowers  !  I  have  n't 
seen  one  of  those  you  have  mentioned  for  the  last  half- 
hour  !  "     The  lady  laughed.     **  What  an  eye  you  have 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  OBSERVE?    2$ 

for  rabbits  and  other  *  small  deer ' ! "  she  said.  "  I 
have  n't  seen  one  this  whole  afternoon." 

So  it  will  be  clear  that  unless  we  have  some  definite 
training  in  observation,  we  shall  not  see  half  we  should 
like  to  see. 

How  can  we  learn  to  observe  ? 

I  remember  the  heroine  of  a  novel  who  describes  her 
own  education.  She  was  sent  out  every  day  to  take  a 
walk,  and  when  she  came  in  she  was  expected  to  de- 
scribe fully  and  accurately  everything  she  had  seen. 
Such  practice  is  good,  and  within  the  reach  of  everybody. 
Even  a  solitary  individual  can  think  over  what  she  has 
seen,  and  if  she  finds  the  mental  picture  misty,  she  can 
go  to  the  same  place  again  and  observe  more  carefully. 
Still,  I  am  so  great  an  enemy  to  the  waste  of  any  force 
that  I  should  not  think  it  worth  while  to  spend  strength 
in  trying  to  observe  everything ;  I  should  rather  look  at 
things  which  would  bear  some  fruit  in  thought. 

Any  science  studied  in  a  rational  way  is  a  positive 
help  to  one  who  is  learning  to  observe.  Those  girls 
who  can  have  teachers,  and  who  are  aware  of  being  un- 
observant, should  study  at  least  one  science  faithfully 
with  a  good  instructor.  But  as  I  am  writing  especially 
for  those  to  whom  self-culture  means  culture  by  them- 
selves as  well  as  of  themselves,  I  will  describe  a  few 
methods  of  working. 

The  sciences  most  accessible  to  those  who  must 
study  alone  are,  I  think,  botany  and  mineralogy. 


26       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

I  knew  a  young  lady  living  in  the  country  who  wished 
to  understand  botany,  but  who  had  no  teacher.  She 
bought  Gray's  "Lessons  in  Botany,"  —  a  small  book, 
clearly  written,  —  and  thoroughly  mastered  it.  She  veri- 
fied everything  so  far  as  she  could :  she  planted  beans 
and  watched  their  growth ;  she  looked  at  the  shrubs 
about  the  garden  to  see  whether  they  multiplied  by  suck- 
ers or  stolons ;  she  noticed  how  seed-pods  were  formed, 
and  found  out  for  herself  the  difference  between  a  black- 
berry and  a  strawberry.  She  gathered  leaves  and  com- 
pared their  shapes  with  those  described  by  Gray,  and 
soon  learned  the  technical  names. 

By  the  time  she  had  finished  the  book  she  had  formed 
the  habit  of  seeing  a  thousand  details  of  vegetable  life 
which  had  formerly  escaped  her,  though  she  was  observ- 
ing. Then  she  took  Gray's  "  Manual  of  Botany."  This 
is  a  large  volume  full  of  scientific  descriptions  which  are 
so  apt  to  daunt  the  beginner  that  perhaps  most  girls 
could  do  better  with  the  "  Field  and  Garden  Botany  "  of 
the  same  author,  though  this  is  much  less  complete.  Our 
student  worked  with  the  artificial  key;  and  beginning 
with  a  few  common  flowers  whose  English  name  slie 
knew,  and  tracing  them  till  she  found  their  Latin  syno- 
nyms and  saw  how  they  were  related  to  other  species, 
she  finally  learned  how  to  classify  and  name  any  unknown 
flower  she  might  encounter.  She  soon  became  an  expert 
in  this  fascinating  work.     Of  course  she  made  blunders. 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  OBSERVE?    2/ 

Of  course  she  found  words  She  did  not  understand ;  but 
she  looked  for  these  faithfully  in  the  glossary,  and  as  she 
had  to  apply  her  definition  on  the  spot  to  the  flower  in 
hand,  she  learned  it  practically,  and  seldom  had  to  look 
for  the  same  word  twice.  It  was  a  pleasure  to  find  out 
the  name  of  a  flower;  but  it  was  something  more  than 
that,  for  the  necessity  of  examining  every  part  to  make 
sure  that  the  specimen  agreed  with  the  description 
brought  out  many  a  beautiful  feature  which  would  other- 
wise have  been  unsuspected.  In  short,  our  young  friend 
learned  to  observe. 

A  lady  who  has  a  world-wide  reputation  for  what  she 
has  accomplished  in  science  said  to  me  once,  "Oh,  I 
studied  botany  in  the  old-fashioned  way,  —  analyzed  and 
pressed  three  hundred  flowers  !  You  know  we  do  not 
consider  that  botany  at  all  now.  Nevertheless  some  of 
that  old-fashioned  study  is  a  very  necessary  foundation 
for  real  scientific  work." 

It  has  always  seemed  to  me  that  we  should  learn  to 
use  our  eyes  well  before  we  spent  much  time  over  a 
microscope,  though  that  is  an  instrument  which  endows 
us  with  a  new  sense.  I  have  always  thought,  too, 
that  we  must  learn  to  know  something  of  individual 
flowers  before  we  could  get  much  real  mental  nourish- 
ment from  the  delightful  effort  to  comprehend  their  rela- 
tionships or  from  our  guesses  at  the  history  of  their 
development.      I   hope,   indeed,    that   every   girl    who 


28       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

decides  to  learn  a  little  botany  for  herself  will  by  and  by 
own  a  fine  microscope,  and  that  some  time  she  may 
study  the  science  philosophically ;  but  at  first  I  think  the 
outline  I  have  indicated  will  be  enough  for  her,  and  it 
will  be  impossible  for  her  to  follow  it  without  learning  to 
observe  some  things.  She  \\dll  see  more  and  more.  At 
last  she  will  probably  seem  to  her  companions  to 
have  what  an  old  professor  of  botany  used  to  call  the 
"  top  eye,"  because  she  will  see  so  much  that  they 
miss. 

The  field  is  inexhaustible.  I  knew  a  lady  who  had 
taught  botany  for  some  years  —  and  had  taught  it 
well  —  who  once  spent  a  few  weeks  of  leisure  at  home, 
and  in  the  time  found  one  hundred  and  eighty  species 
of  plants  before  unknown  to  her  in  her  father's  own 
small  field  and  orchard  1 

Hugh  Miller  is  the  most  illustrious  example  of  a  self- 
taught  geologist.  He  was  a  stone-cutter,  poor,  and  know- 
ing no  one  who  could  teach  him.  He  made  a  collection 
of  all  the  different  kinds  of  minerals  he  found  in  the 
course  of  his  stone-cutting,  and  being  ignorant  of  their 
names,  he  labelled  them  i,  2,  3,  etc.  He  examined  and 
compared  them  till  he  knew  their  properties  perfectly ; 
and  when  several  years  later  he  was  able  to  buy  a  book 
on  mineralogy,  all  the  numbers  fell  into  place  as  by  magic, 
—  he  had  nothing  to  do  but  to  substitute  the  names 
quartz,  feldspar,  tourmaline,  etc.,  for  the  numbers  he  had 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO   OBSERVE?        29 

used  so  long.  He  had  real  genius,  and  was  capable  of 
seeing  for  himself  some  of  the  laws  which  govern  facts ; 
but  even  a  simple  girl  who  wished  to  know  about  minerals 
could  learn  something  by  following  his  plan. 

It  is  easier,  however,  to  get  help  now  than  it  was  in 
his  day.  Some  one  who  was  about  to  spend  ten  cents 
for  a  Christmas  card  to  send  to  a  friend  remembered 
that  this  friend  was  interested  in  looking  at  stone-walls, 
and  mailed  to  her  instead  a  little  pamphlet  on  mineralogy 
by  Mrs.  Richards  of  the  Boston  Institute  of  Technology. 
The  young  girl  receiving  it  saw  that  its  brief  pages  were 
full  of  instruction  for  her.  She  showed  it  to  two  or  three 
other  girls  of  similar  tastes,  and  they  formed  a  little  club 
for  studying  mineralogy  with  specimens.  As  they  went 
on,  they  bought  a  few  larger  books,  —  Dana,  Brush,  etc., 
—  and  they  soon  became  better  mineralogists  than  most 
girls  who  study  the  subject  in  school.  They  learned  to 
see  everything  about  their  own  homes.  As  the  analysis 
of  minerals  by  Dana's  or  Brush's  method  required  more 
knowledge  of  chemistry  than  they  had,  they  contented 
themselves  with  Crosby's  little  book  of  "  Tables,"  which 
deals  chiefly  with  simple  physical  tests.  They  also 
studied  rock-structures  with  the  aid  of  another  little 
book  of  Professor  Crosby,  **  Science  Guide  No.  12," 
published  by  the  Boston  Natural  History  Society.  The 
volume  costs  forty  cents,  and  a  hundred  typical  minerals 
which  illustrate  it  two  dollars  more.    I  give  these  details, 


30       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

thinking  that  some  other  girl  may  Hke  to  follow  their 
example.  I  should  not  of  course  wish  to  have  any 
one  think  that  I  suppose  it  is  necessary  to  study  exactly 
in  this  way  to  develop  one's  powers  of  observation; 
but  this  is  one  way  that  has  been  tested,  and  so  it  may 
prove  to  be  a  help  to  somebody. 

I  have  known  several  girls  who  learned  something  of 
ornithology,  and  increased  their  observing  faculty  greatly, 
by  simply  walking  in  the  fields  and  woods  and  listening 
to  the  birds.  At  first  the  vocal  concert  seemed  bewilder- 
ing; then  they  began  to  distinguish  the  different  per- 
formers; then  they  would  be  fortunate  enough  to  see 
one  of  the  singers ;  and  by  this  time  they  would  be  ready 
to  concentrate  their  attention  so  that  they  could  give  a 
fair  description  of  the  bird.  Now  all  that  was  wanting 
was  the  name.  Perhaps  they  could  not  find  that  out  for 
a  long  time,  though  one  who  has  access  either  to  a  good 
museum  or  to  illustrated  books  on  ornithology  need  have 
little  difficulty.  None  of  these  girls  were  very  scientific. 
They  did  not  know  which  way  the  arch  of  the  aorta 
turned  in  passing  from  the  heart  of  a  bird,  —  though 
that  is  a  matter  of  real  interest,  —  nor  even  the  relation 
of  the  two  stomachs ;  but  they  had  learned  to  observe, 
and  the  world  was  fuller  to  them  in  consequence. 

Modern  teachers  of  botany  and  zoology  insist  not  only 
on  the  study  of  the  objects  themselves,  but  that  the 
pupil  should  endeavour  to  draw  what  he  sees.     '*  \'ou 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  OBSERVE?   3 1 

must  observe  to  draw,"  says  one  of  them.  And  that  is 
true,  —  not  only  in  scientific  studies,  but  in  every  depart- 
ment. Even  if  we  do  not  know  how  to  draw  according 
to  any  rule,  the  attempt  to  reproduce  what  we  see  always 
helps  us  to  see,  and  so  drawing  must  be  a  branch  partic- 
ularly recommended  to  those  who  wish  to  improve  their 
powers  of  observation.  This  kind  of  drawing  is  possible 
without  a  teacher,  though  of  course  it  is  better  to  have 
instruction. 

One  of  Mrs.  Whitney's  heroines,  speaking  of  a  visit  to 
Italy,  says  that  her  crude  attempts  to  copy  some  of  the 
Madonnas  were  worth  everything  to  her,  because  she 
saw  so  much  more  in  the  picture  in  consequence. 

All  art  study  affords  training  in  observation,  and  par- 
ticularly in  observation  of  the  beautiful,  so  that  it  is  of 
the  highest  value.  We  want  to  learn  what  to  see  quite 
as  much  as  how  to  see.  I  remember  visiting  once  the 
exhibition-room  of  a  much-praised  artist,  and  being  struck 
by  the  vitality  of  the  pictures.  Every  motion  and  atti- 
tude of  the  figures  expressed  life.  I  asked  an  acquaint- 
ance, who  was  a  good  judge  of  pictures,  how  he  liked 
the  exhibition.  "  It  is  wonderful !  "  he  said,  **  but  I  do 
not  care  for  it,  because  the  artist  seems  to  have  no  per- 
ception of  beauty."  I  felt  that  the  criticism  was  just, 
and  it  seemed  almost  a  pity  that  such  powers  of  observa- 
tion and  expression  should  be  spent  on  inferior  objects. 
Now,  a  girl  working  by  herself  cannot  become  an  artist, 


32       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

but  I  think  any  one  can  learn  to  look  at  the  world  with 
something  of  an  artist's  eye  simply  by  daily  selecting 
the  most  beautiful  point  within  one's  horizon,  and  trying 
to  remember  it  perfectly  with  the  eyes  shut.  In  the 
same  way  we  may  learn  to  know  pictures  accurately. 

As  the  senses  furnish  the  avenue  to  convey  impressions 
of  the  outside  world  to  us,  they  must  be  cared  for.  We 
must  not  strain  our  eyes,  lest  they  fail  us,  nor  may  we 
allow  ourselves  to  take  cold  lest  our  ears  should  grow 
dull.     More  than  this,  we  must  cultivate  our  senses. 

I  once  knew  a  young  girl  whose  senses  were  of  little 
use  to  her.  They  were  apparently  perfect  as  bodily 
organs,  but  they  did  not  seem  to  belong  to  her.  She 
was  always  busy  thinking.  While  taking  a  walk  she 
would  reflect  upon  the  fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  or 
the  rise  of  the  Dutch  Republic.  She  believed  in  fresh 
air,  but  was  often  unconscious  of  ill  odours.  She  had 
a  good  appetite,  but  could  not  tell  when  her  food 
was  well  cooked. 

This  young  girl  had  a  strong  desire  for  all  kinds  of 
knowledge.  She  studied  botany  and  geology  and  orni- 
thology. By  and  by  she  became  a  delightful  out-door 
companion.  She  saw  the  tiniest  flowers  hidden  in  long 
grass.  She  knew  the  colouring  and  the  stnicture  of  every 
stone  in  the  wall.  *<  Without  a  gim,"  she  had  named 
<*  all  the  birds  "  by  their  songs.     Yet  she  was  as  stupid 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  OBSERVE?   33 

as  ever  in  a  city  street.  She  never  could  tell  what 
fashions  the  ladies  were  wearing,  she  never  noticed  the 
shop  windows,  and  she  was  always  losing  her  way.  All 
of  us  who  are  not  absolute  dunces  can  "  see  what  we  go 
to  see,"  and  her  training  in  the  sciences  had  simply 
enlarged  the  circle  of  things  that  she  looked  at  inten- 
tionally. She  had  trained  her  eyes  and  ears  to  report 
more  readily  to  the  brain  than  formerly.  I  do  not  know 
that  the  organs  themselves  had  changed. 

After  this  it  fell  to  her  lot  to  keep  house  for  a  while. 
"  I  pity  her  husband,"  said  her  sister,  "  for  she  will  never 
know  when  the  bread  is  sour."  Strange  to  say,  however, 
she  set  an  excellent  table.  It  was  one  of  her  principles 
that  everybody  should  have  wholesome  food.  It  had 
never  before  been  her  responsibility  to  provide  it.  Now 
that  it  was  so,  she  turned  her  attention  to  what  she  ate, 
and  soon  discovered  the  difference  between  good  food 
and  bad.  She  was  accustomed  to  say  that  it  seemed  as 
if  new  papillae  had  come  into  being  on  the  surface  of 
her  tongue,  because  it  was  now  easy  for  her  to  detect 
tastes  which  once  it  was  impossible  to  distinguish  even 
when  she  concentrated  all  her  energies  on  the  task. 
Perhaps  some  physiologist  will  tell  us  whether  she  was 
right. 

It  was  on  account  of  the  same  application  of  principle 
to  life  that  she  learned  to  put  to  rout  all  bad  smells  that 
invaded  her  house.     "A  housekeeper  should  cultivate 

3 


34      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

her  nose  as  she  does  her  character,"  says  a  friend.  Our 
heroine  did  this,  and  achieved  success.  "  But  in  other 
people's  houses,  where  I  can  cast  off  care/'  she  would 
remark,  *'  I  am  as  unconscious  as  ever  when  anything 
is  wrong." 

We  say  that  the  power  to  enjoy  involves  an  equal 
power  to  suffer,  which  is  probably  true ;  but  it  does  not 
follow  that  those  who  enjoy  most  must  actually  suffer 
most.  I  know  a  woman  keenly  alive  to  the  fragrance  of 
flowers  who  says  she  is  seldom  troubled  by  evil  odours. 
**  I  always  put  myself  out  of  the  path  of  every  breeze 
that  is  laden  with  foulness,"  she  says,  *'  while  I  always 
turn  toward  the  *  south  wind  that  comes  o'er  gardens  ;  * 
so  I  get  all  the  pleasure,  and  little  of  the  pain,  that 
comes  from  an  acute  sense."  But  perhaps  the  sense  or- 
ganules  of  the  nose  which  take  note  of  bad  odours  are 
not  the  same  as  those  which  perceive  pleasant  ones. 
At  all  events,  the  keenest  scented  dogs  seem  incapable 
of  noticing  beautiful  perfumes.  So  it  may  not  even  be 
true  that  in  increasing  our  power  to  enjoy  we  increase 
our  power  to  suffer.  By  diligently  cultivating  agreeable 
sensations,  it  may  be  we  render  ourselves  callous  to 
disagreeable  ones. 

What  is  a  musical  ear?  Many  persons  of  quick  hear- 
ing cannot  distinguish  musical  tones  with  certainty. 
Physiologists  suggest  that  of  the  thousands  of  little  hairs 
which  line  the  interior  of  tlie  ear,  each  may  vibrate  to 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  OBSERVE?   35 

some  one  tone,  while  it  is  probable  that  the  musical 
notes  are  appreciated  in  but  one  division  of  the  ear. 
Very  likely  this  part  of  the  ear  is  furnished  with  fewer 
hairs  in  the  case  of  unmusical  people  than  with  others. 
How  is  it  then  that  by  attention  to  good  music,  by 
always  hearing  it  and  practising  it,  so  many  people  do 
really  learn  to  distinguish  tones?  Can  there  possibly  be 
a  change  in  the  ear  itself?  No  doubt  the  best  explana- 
tion is  that  the  brain  learns  how  to  receive  the  impres- 
sions on  the  tympanum.  There  is  the  same  question  in 
regard  to  discriminating  tints  in  colour.  It  is  pretty 
well  proved  that  the  cultivated  eye  has  a  different  sense- 
lining  from  the  uncultivated  one.  And  Tyndall  tells 
us  that  each  generation  adds  something  to  the  organ 
itself. 

We  also  learn  from  the  scientists  that  there  are  in- 
cipient senses.  These  seem  to  be  developed  by  culti- 
vation. I  do  not  know  that  the  power  of  finding 
one's  way  can  be  called  a  special  sense,  yet  the  differ- 
ence between  people  would  almost  make  us  believe  it. 
This  would  be  a  sense  of  such  practical  value  that  it  is 
worth  some  pains  to  cultivate  it.  Most  of  us  try  to 
make  up  for  our  deficiencies  in  this  respect  by  tracing 
our  way  upon  maps,  and  that  does  help  us.  Others  say 
it  is  all  a  matter  of  observation,  and  that  one  could  learn 
to  do  as  well  as  another.  I  have  always  wondered  if 
some  persons  were  not  born  with  a  correct  idea  of  the 


36      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

points  of  the  compass,  for  after  all  everything  depends 
on  our  ability  to  turn  in  the  right  direction.  I  have  a 
theory  that  the  powers  of  the  stupid  might  be  improved 
by  carrying  a  pocket-compass.  Of  course  all  improve- 
ment is  easiest  for  the  young,  and  if  any  girl  who  reads 
these  words  is  aware  that  she  has  no  organ  of  "  locality," 
I  really  wish  she  would  try  the  following  experiment  for 
a  year.  First,  let  her  fix  the  points  of  the  compass  in 
her  own  home ;  then  whenever  she  goes  away  from  it, 
even  for  a  short  walk,  let  her  see  if  she  still  has  them 
in  her  mind,  by  comparing  her  idea  of  them  with  the 
compass  itself.  It  could  not  do  her  any  harm,  and 
would  probably  do  some  good ;  she  might  not  create 
a  new  sense,  but  she  certainly  would  become  more 
observing. 

The  line  between  the  sense  itself  and  the  power  of 
observation  is  hard  to  draw.  I  knew  a  young  lady  who 
became  partially  deaf,  but  it  was  a  long  time  before  any 
one  but  her  aurist  knew  it,  for  she  was  so  clever  and 
quick-witted  that  she  watched  others,  and  learned  from 
their  motions  and  expression  what  they  said.  An  oculist 
said  to  a  friend  the  other  day,  "  Ah,  you  do  not  tell  me 
the  tnith !  You  cannot  really  read  at  that  distance; 
you  are  one  of  those  who  read  with  the  will  and  not 
with  the  eyes."  She  was  surprised,  but  when  suitable 
glasses  were  fitted  to  her  she  found  he  was  right. 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  OBSERVE?    37 

So  something  more  than  the  senses  or  than  observa- 
tion must  always  be  allowed  for  in  what  we  see  and 
hear,  taste,  smell,  and  touch.  There  is  a  certain 
moral  element  in  observation.  Let  us  decide  hence- 
forth to  see  not  only  what  we  go  to  see,  but  what 
we  ought  to  see. 

Acting  on  this  principle,  girls  would  oftener  see  when 
their  mothers  look  tired,  or  when  they  are  in  their 
brothers'  way.  I  once  knew  a  quiet  girl  who  never 
seemed  to  be  observing  anything,  yet  when  a  chair  was 
needed  she  was  always  ready  to  set  it  in  place ;  she 
always  opened  the  door  when  any  one  whose  hands  were 
full  wished  to  pass ;  and  in  a  crowded  room  she  could 
find  for  herself  the  comer  where  she  was  least  likely  to 
be  a  stumbling-block  for  others.  Perhaps  she  could  not 
have  told  you  what  everybody  wore,  but  I  think  she 
understood  the  true  uses  of  the  observing  faculty. 


IV. 

HOW   SHALL   WE   LEARN  TO   REMEMBER? 

FEW  in  these  days  are  inclined  to  glorify  the  mem- 
ory at  the  expense  of  the  other  mental  faculties. 
I  heard  a  lady  say  not  long  ago,  in  reference  to  a  young 
girl  who  had  come  into  her  school  with  extravagant 
recommendations  from  former  teachers,  "  She  has  abil- 
ity; that  is,  she  can  learn  by  the  yard,  but  I  doubt 
whether  she  has  real  intellect."  The  capacity  to  learn 
by  the  yard,  however,  is  not  to  be  despised,  if  it  is  not 
allowed  to  overshadow  more  important  powers.  For 
instance,  we  might  choose  to  have  good  judgment  rather 
than  a  good  memory.  Nevertheless,  if  we  could  not 
remember  the  facts  we  were  to  judge,  our  judicial  pow- 
ers, admirable  as  they  might  be,  would  prove  rather 
unfruitful.  Memory  should  have  its  own  honourable 
place  in  our  mental  equipment.  It  converts  our  vari- 
ous observations  into  available  knowledge,  ready  to 
be  acted  upon  by  the  judgment.  First,  we  must  see 
clearly,  then  wc  must  remember  accurately,  then  we 
must  judge  truly. 


HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO   REMEMBER?      39 

Some  of  us  may  be  able  to  remember  all  kinds  of 
things  without  difficulty,  but  most  of  us  are  not  so  en- 
dowed ;  and  therefore,  since  we  must  concentrate  our 
efforts  on  learning  a  few  of  the  many  things  we  should 
like  to  know,  it  is  well  to  consider  what  we  most  wish  to 
retain  before  we  make  plans  how  to  accomplish  our 
object. 

First,  we  want  to  remember  whatever  it  is  our  duty  to 
remember. 

As  our  duties  differ,  I  will  not  say  much  in  detail  on 
this  head.  I  have  heard  of  a  lady  so  engrossed  in  study 
that  she  forgot  to  see  that  dinner  was  provided  for  the 
family;  I  have  no  doubt  she  enjoyed  some  sublime 
thoughts  meantime,  but  they  could  not  have  really  ele- 
vated her  character.  Girls  sometimes  forget  to  feed 
their  pets;  they  often  forget  little  commissions  given 
them  by  their  mothers;  they  forget  to  take  the  right 
books  to  school;  they  forget  where  their  lessons  are, 
and  a  hundred  things  which  inconvenience  other  per- 
sons as  well  as  themselves.  It  is  certainly  a  school- 
girl's duty  to  know  her  lessons,  even  when  she  sees  no 
particular  advantage  in  them,  and  although  it  is  true  that 
teachers  sometimes  give  absurd  lessons.  I  suppose  we 
all  know,  in  a  general  way,  what  our  special  duties  are, 
and  can  apply  the  formula  for  ourselves. 

Sometimes  we  say  we  cannot  remember  the  things 
we  ought.     I  have  been  told  that  Dr.  James  Freeman 


40       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

Clarke  once  preached  a  sermon  on  this  subject.  He 
said  we  could  remember  whatever  we  felt  a  deep  interest 
in  remembering.  During  the  following  week  he  discov- 
ered one  day  that  he  had  entirely  forgotten  something 
which  caused  him  great  personal  loss  and  annoyance,  — 
something  which  he  had  a  deep  interest  in  remember- 
ing. The  next  Sunday  when  he  entered  the  pulpit,  he 
took  occasion,  with  his  usual  candour,  to  mention  the 
circumstance,  and  to  retract  all  he  had  said  the  Sun- 
day before.  Nevertheless  it  is  true  that  the  things  we 
most  want  to  remember  are  those  which  it  is  our  duty 
to  remember. 

Second,  we  want  to  remember  whatever  will  add  to 
the  happiness  of  others.  This  is  perhaps  a  branch  of 
our  first  proposition ;  yet  I  emphasize  it,  because  there 
are  so  many  small  acts  not  strictly  our  duty  which  we 
could  do  every  day,  and  which  we  should  be  glad  to  do 
if  we  could  only  think  of  them.     These  are  the 

"Little  nameless,  unremembered  acts  of  kindness  and  of  love," 

—  "unremembered,"  that  is,  after  they  are  done.  The 
quality  we  call  "  thoughtfulness  for  others,"  which  lends 
a  special  charm  to  the  character  of  some  young  girls,  is 
greatly  due  to  this  fine  use  of  memory. 

In  these  two  directions  we  want  to  remember  certain 
definite  things,  and  we  arc  justified  in  resorting  to  the 
most  artificial  means  for  the  purpose.     If  I  have  prom- 


HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO   REMEMBER?      41 

ised  to  lend  you  a  book,  it  is  quite  right  for  me  to 
remind  myself  of  it  by  changing  a  ring  to  another  finger. 
Much  more  would  this  be  right  if  I  had  reason  to  sup- 
pose I  should  forget  to  return  a  book  I  had  borrowed. 

We  might  perhaps  use  artificial  means  to  remember 
anything  which  would  add  to  our  own  happiness,  though 
here  we  are  less  likely  to  forget.  Still,  I  once  knew  a 
young  man  who  was  so  busy  getting  his  affairs  in  order 
for  his  wedding  journey  that  he  forgot  to  look  at  the 
clock,  and  missed  the  train  that  was  to  take  him  to 
the  ceremony. 

But  for  any  intellectual  purpose,  artificial  stimulants 
to  the  memory  are  often  worse  than  useless. 

Now,  third,  we  want  to  remember  as  many  facts  as  we 
can  make  use  of  in  any  way,  either  to  aid  our  judgment 
or  to  enlarge  our  minds.  I  hope  that  few  of  us  —  few 
even  of  girls  fourteen  or  fifteen  years  old  —  fancy  that 
isolated  facts  have  much  value.  Once  during  my  child- 
hood a  lecturer  came  into  our  village  with  the  announce- 
ment that  he  had  invented  a  system  for  remembering 
everything.  He  selected  one  of  the  brightest  little  girls 
in  school,  and  after  training  her  one  afternoon,  he  ex- 
hibited her  to  his  audience  in  the  evening.  He  asked 
for  dates  of  the  most  disconnected  facts  one  after  an- 
other, and  she  gave  every  one  triumphantly.  I  am  not 
quite  sure  that  she  could  not  have  learned  them  as 
quickly  without  any  system,  though    in    that  case  she 


42       CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

would  have  probably  forgotten  them  sooner.  Then  the 
lecturer  explained  his  method  of  teaching  her.  I  re- 
member but  one  example,  —  she  had  said  that  Judge 
Story  died  in  1845.  Each  figure  corresponded  to  some 
letter  in  the  professor's  scheme.  The  "  i  "  being  disre- 
garded, "845"  represented  f  r  1.  This  was  to  remind 
the  learner  of  the  word  "  farewell  "  from  which  it  was  an 
easy  step  to  say  that  Judge  Story  bade  farewell  to  the 
world  at  that  date  !  She  then  retranslated  the  word 
"  farewell "  into  figures,  and  had  won  her  fact.  I  am 
positive  that  she  had  no  idea  who  Judge  Story  was  or 
why  it  was  essential  to  know  the  date  of  his  death.  In- 
deed if  any  one  tells  me  that  I  am  wrong  in  that  partic- 
ular I  shall  not  insist  that  I  am  not ;  or  rather,  I  know  I 
am  not  mistaken  in  the  date,  but  it  may  be  that  it  was 
some  other  judge  who  died  then  !  So  it  does  not  seem 
to  me  that  this  was  a  very  fructifying  fact  for  either  of  us 
to  know.  Moreover  I  have  often  wondered  what  could 
have  been  done  with  any  other  events  which  had  hap- 
pened to  occur  in  1845,  ^^^  instance  those  connected 
with  the  Mexican  War,  since  **  farewell "  would  have 
stood  uncompromisingly  for  every  one  of  them. 

There  are  many  memory-systems  extant,  —  some 
no  doubt  much  better  than  others,  —  but  it  is  a 
great  question  whether  arbitrary  facts,  however  firmly 
fixed  in  the  mind,  do  not  on  the  whole  cumber  the 
ground  instead  of  enriching  it.     Of  course  any  fact  may 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO   REMEMBER?     43 

sometime  be  of  use.  Thrifty  housekeepers  often  save 
odds  and  ends  with  the  plea  that  "  sometime  the  want  of 
it  will  be  more  than  the  worth  of  it."  Even  in  the  case 
of  housekeepers  it  may  be  questioned  whether  it  is  wise 
to  fill  small  rooms  with  debris  which  has  only  a  prospec- 
tive usefulness ;  and  what  shall  we  say  of  a  Toodles  who 
actually  goes  out  and  buys  a  coffin  because  "  sometime 
it  will  be  handy  to  have  it  in  the  house  "  ?  The  brains 
of  most  of  us  are  too  limited  in  capacity  to  be  crowded 
with  a  great  deal  of  unassorted  material.  We  cannot 
afford  to  know  everything.  We  cannot  therefore  afford  to 
use  a  system  which  insists  on  teaching  us  everything. 

In  one  of  Miss  Edgeworth's  stories,  —  **  The  Good 
French  Governess,"  I  think,  —  she  describes  a  young 
girl  who  had  been  taught  entirely  by  memorizing  facts. 
Isabella  expected  to  astonish  her  new  governess  by  the 
glibness  with  which  she  recited  a  list  of  the  dates  of  in- 
ventions, beginning,  I  dare  say,  with  Greek  fire  and  com- 
ing down  to  the  steam-engine.  The  governess,  however, 
refused  to  be  overwhelmed,  but  asked  the  young  lady 
what  was  the  use  of  all  these  dates.  The  pupil  coloured, 
stammered,  and  finally  said  it  was  certainly  a  good  thing 
to  know  when  paper  was  first  used.  The  governess  was 
not  easily  persuaded  even  of  this ;  but  at  last  glancing 
over  the  list  again,  she  noticed  that  many  years  had 
elapsed  between  the  invention  of  paper  and  that  of 
printing  —  far    be    it    from    me    to   know   how   many ! 


44      CHATS  WITH  GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

*'That  is  worth  knowing,"  she  said.  "It  shows  how 
very  slowly  invention  progressed  in  those  days."  You 
see,  with  her,  facts  to  be  worth  anything  must  lead  to 
an  end. 

However,  it  is  no  doubt  an  innocent  ambition  to  wish 
to  be  well-informed,  so  I  will  add  to  the  list  of  things  we 
want  to  remember  — 

Fourth,  the  things  that  others  about  us  know  and 
expect  us  to  know. 

This  kind  of  memory  has  a  practical  value.  It  helps 
us  to  appear  well ;  sometimes  it  helps  us  to  earn  money ; 
but  so  far  as  the  culture  either  of  our  mind  or  character 
is  concerned,  it  is  not  worth  much. 

When  I  was  a  girl  I  heard  a  cousin  of  mine,  then  in 
college,  tell  the  story  of  a  fellow-student  who  was  dis- 
covered reading  one  of  Scott's  novels  in  a  corner  of  the 
library,  and  who  inquired  very  earnestly,  "  Who  was  this 
*Waverley,'  anyhow?"  That  struck  the  group  of  cousins 
as  a  great  joke.  None  of  us  could  understand  how  any- 
body who  could  read  could  be  so  ignorant.  Since  then, 
however,  I  have  no  doubt  that  all  of  us  have  made 
blunders  which  stamped  us  as  equally  ignorant  in  the 
estimation  of  those  who  detected  them.  I  should  be 
able  to  forgive  the  young  reader  in  the  library  now, 
especially  if  I  found  that  he  was  capable  of  enjoying 
Scott,  which  some  of  those  who  have  "  Waverley's " 
biography  at  their  tongue's  end  seem  to  be  incapable  of 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO   REMEMBER?      45 

doing.  We  are  always  ready  to  laugh  at  anybody  who 
does  not  know  what  we  know,  and  that  is  one  reason  we 
have  such  agonies  of  fear  lest  somebody  should  discover 
the  weak  spots  in  our  own  armour.  But  why  should 
we  be  ashamed  not  to  know  a  thing?  No  one  can  know 
ever}lhing.  The  greatest  men,  if  they  would  take  you 
into  their  confidence,  would  probably  tell  you  that  they 
had  sometimes  made  mistakes  at  which  a  schoolboy 
would  blush;  yet  the  most  philosophical  among  us  do 
suffer  more  from  involuntary  slips  of  memory  than  from 
the  infraction  of  some  weightier  matters  of  the  law. 
And  not  altogether  without  reason;  for  all  of  us  who 
have  had  refined  and  educated  parents,  and  who  have 
had  the  ordinary  school  advantages,  do  know  certain  cur- 
rent facts,  unless  we  are  extraordinarily  stupid,  or  have 
been  culpably  careless.  We  condemn  ourselves  when 
we  admit  our  ignorance.  Yet  not  one  of  us  is  infallible ; 
so  when  we  laugh  at  other  people's  blunders,  let  us  be 
good-natured,  and  when  we  give  other  people  occasion 
to  laugh  at  us,  let  us  still  be  good-natured ;  and  more- 
over let  us  not  be  too  downcast  because  of  our  short- 
comings, but  try  to  improve. 

And  now,  at  last,  how  shall  we  make  our  own  all  the 
manifold  facts  we  want  to  remember? 

We  can  fix  the  host  of  little  items  belonging  to  our 
duties  by  making  memoranda  in  a  pocket  note-book  and 
consulting  these  every  day.     A  lady  connected  with  a 


46       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

great  Boston  daily  paper  relates  that  the  number  of  de- 
tails she  feels  obliged  not  to  forget  is  so  great  that  she 
keeps  a  diary  laid  out  for  months  in  advance,  and  that  in 
May  of  one  year  she  entered  the  memorandum,  "  Nov. 

12.    To  be  married  to ."     Perhaps  we  should 

not  all  need  such  scrupulous  notes  as  that,  but  I  think 
any  of  us  may  use  those  we  do  need  without  compunc- 
tion. I  know  a  young  lady  who  is  confidential  clerk  in 
a  large  business  house.  She  said  a  few  days  ago  that  she 
was  almost  beside  herself  with  the  number  of  things  she 
must  remember,  but  that  she  supposed  it  would  be 
ruinous  to  her  memory  if  she  kept  lists  of  them.  I 
believe  she  was  quite  wrong.  Her  object  is  to  do  cer- 
tain things  at  certain  times,  not  to  be  able  to  repeat  the 
list  in  alphabetical  order.  If  she  could  only  relieve  her 
mind  of  all  this  unnecessary  strain,  she  could  exercise  it 
sufficiently  for  sound  health  upon  those  things  which  she 
really  wants  to  be  laid  up  in  its  store-house  forevermore. 
Of  course  she  must  remember  enough  of  the  business  to 
guide  her  intelligently  in  carrying  it  on. 

For  learning  those  things  which  are  to  be  a  perma- 
nent addition  to  our  stock  of  knowledge,  a  few  simple 
principles  must  be  observed. 

I.  We  must  get  an  accurate  impression  of  what  we 
want  to  remember. 

This  is  closely  connected  with  our  powers  of  observa- 
tion.    Those  who  obser\'e  well  do  not  forget  what  they 


HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN   TO   REMEMBER?      47 

see.  But  we  want  to  remember  a  great  many  things 
besides  those  we  see.  In  studying  history,  for  instance, 
suppose  we  think  that  it  would  be  a  disgrace  to  any 
American  woman  not  to  know  the  principles  laid  down 
in  the  Declaration  of  Independence;  we  must  study 
that  document,  not  only  as  a  whole,  but  sentence  by 
sentence,  and  make  sure  that  we  see  exactly  what  it 
means.  More  than  that,  we  must  read  its  history,  and 
find  out  what  we  can  of  the  motives  which  influenced 
the  various  signers ;  and  by  that  time,  I  think,  we  might 
have  our  "  accurate  impression."  If  we  consider  study 
of  this  kind  beyond  us,  we  may  be  right ;  but  in  that 
case  we  shall  have  to  give  up  learning  the  Declaration 
of  Independence. 

I  once  knew  a  young  woman  whose  early  education 
had  been  neglected.  At  last  the  opportunity  to  go  to 
school  came  to  her.  She  was  full  of  ambition,  and  ready 
to  study  night  and  day;  but  she  could  never  learn  a 
lesson.  She  failed  so  utterly  one  day  on  some  rules  for 
parsing  that  the  teacher  spoke  to  her  privately  of  the 
matter.  The  poor  girl  grew  red  in  the  face,  and  then 
burst  into  tears.  ''  I  studied.  Miss  Smith,  till  I  fainted 
away,"  she  said.  And  yet  she  did  not  know  the  very 
first  rule :  "  Adjectives  and  participles  belong  to  nouns 
and  pronouns."  The  teacher  wondered  how  such  hard 
study  could  produce  such  a  small  result,  and  on  inquiry 
learned  that  the  poor  student,  in  her  desire  to  be  thor- 


48       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

ough,  had  studied  each  word  twenty  times  before  going 
on  to  the  next,  — "  Adjectives,  adjectives,  adjectives, 
etc. ;  and,  and,  and,  etc. ;  participles,  participles,  parti- 
ciples, etc."  She  had  a  perception  of  the  separate 
words,  but  naturally  saw  no  connection  between  them. 
We  need  a  whole  impression  of  whatever  we  are  trying 
to  learn. 

2.  We  must  think  about  what  we  are  learning. 

As  long  as  we  are  looking  at  an  object,  or  reading 
about  an  event,  our  minds  may  wander  without  our 
knowing  it.  But  when  we  shut  our  eyes  and  try  to  re- 
call the  object  or  the  event,  we  find  out  our  deficiencies 
at  once,  and  can  go  back  to  the  study  with  an  intelligent 
idea  of  the  way  to  supply  them.  We  must  continue  to 
do  this  till  we  have  thoroughly  learned  what  we  are  tr}'ing 
to  learn.  We  shall  succeed  in  the  end,  unless  we  have 
undertaken  some  subject  really  beyond  our  powers ;  and 
in  that  case,  the  sooner  we  find  it  out  the  better. 

3.  Frequent  repetition  is  necessary  to  keep  anything 
in  our  minds. 

Even  when  we  have  mastered  some  subject  com- 
pletely for  the  time  being,  yet  if  we  put  it  aside  and  go 
on  to  another  subject,  we  shall  find  on  coming  back  to  it 
a  few  months  later  that  some  of  the  outlines  are  begin- 
ning to  fade.  We  must  see  that  they  are  traced  firmly 
once  more,  or  we  shall  soon  lose  the  whole  picture.  If, 
however,  we  learned  the  subject  thoroughly  at  first,  it  is 


HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO   REMEMBER?     49 

easy  to  review  it.  "  My  sister  has  to  spend  more  time 
than  I  do  over  advance  lessons,"  said  a  school-girl, 
with  a  roguish  smile ;  *'  but  I  notice  that  it  saves  her 
time  when  we  come  to  reviews."  And  I  have  heard  a 
music-teacher  say  that  a  pupil  who  had  once  learned  to 
play  a  piece  of  music  without  stumbling  could  take  it  up 
again  years  after  with  the  certainty  of  being  able  to  play 
it  correctly  with  half  an  hour's  practice. 

There  are  various  kinds  of  repetition  suited  to  the 
different  things  we  try  to  learn.  For  instance,  let  us 
consider  a  moment  the  different  ways  of  studying  his- 
tory and  poetry,  for  these  two  studies  are  particularly 
adapted  to  the  exercise  of  the  memory,  though  that  is 
by  no  means  the  highest  use  of  either  of  them. 

In  a  poem  every  word  has  a  value ;  it  cannot  be 
changed  or  misplaced  without  destroying  the  beauty  of 
the  passage.  We  must  learn  poetry  verdattfn ;  indeed, 
unless  we  do  so  we  never  quite  take  in  the  full  meaning 
of  even  our  favourite  poems.  This  is  one  reason  why 
learning  poetry  has  such  an  elevating  influence.  Once 
learned,  it  must  be  repeated  over  ^nd  over  again,  every 
day  at  first,  then  every  week  perhaps,  and  then  at  longer 
intervals  ;  and  we  must  not  be  con  ented  with  making  a 
slip  here  and  there.  But  all  this  repetition  takes  time, 
and  has  neither  the  mental  nor  the  moral  value  of  the 
first  learning  of  a  poem.  Besides,  we  may  wish  to  learn 
something  new.     I  am  sure  none  of  us  can  afford  to  let 

4 


50       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   OX   SELF-CULTURE. 

the  habit  of  studying  the  best  poetry  ever  be  lost  out  of 
our  daily  lives.  We  need  its  high  companionship  con- 
stantly. Fortunately,  though  it  is  often  thought  that 
young  people  learn  more  readily  than  older  ones,  it  is 
not  altogether  true.  A  middle-aged  friend  of  mine  tells 
me  that  she  has  made  it  a  point  to  learn  a  few  lines  of 
poetry  every  day  for  many  years,  and  that  she  does  so 
more  and  more  easily ;  but  she  says  she  often  forgets 
what  she  learns,  simply  because  it  is  impossible  to  re- 
peat the  great  numbers  of  poems  she  knows  as  often  as 
she  could  repeat  the  comparatively  small  number  she 
knew  when  a  girl.  Some  of  us  think  it  would  be  hard 
to  find  time  every  day  to  learn  even  a  few  lines ;  but 
surely  we  must  give  a  part  of  every  Sunday  to  such  ele- 
vating study,  and  if  we  learn  half  a  dozen  lines  on  Sun- 
day, and  take  pains  to  repeat  them  every  day  through 
the  week,  we  shall  soon  have  much  good  treasure  laid 
up  where  moth  and  rust  will  not  cornipt. 

It  would  be  mere  folly  to  learn  history  verbatim. 
Here  we  want  facts  first  as  a  foundation,  but  far  more, 
relations  between  facts.  It  may  be  a  good  exercise  for 
us  when  an  examiner  asks  us  all  sorts  of  questions  in  a 
breath  :  "  Who  won  the  battle  of  Waterloo?  "  *'  When 
was  Charles  the  First  beheaded?"  "What  is  the  Ro- 
setta  Stone?"  Indeed,  I  once  knew  a  very  entertain- 
ing teacher  of  history  who  contended  that  the  true  way 
to  equip  her  pupils  to  meet  sudden  demands  upon  them 


HOW  SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO   REMEMBER?      5 1 

was  to  ask  them  such  a  jumble  of  questions  every  day. 
"  Nobody  in  society,"  she  would  say,  "  will  ever  inquire 
whether  you  can  give  a  clear  account  of  the  English 
Revolution  or  not,  but  anybody  may  turn  to  you  and 
ask  when  Charles  the  First  was  beheaded."  She  was 
right;  but  after  all  culture  does  not  consist  in  being 
able  to  answer  other  people's  questions,  —  though,  in- 
deed, as  that  is  very  convenient,  I  think  a  little  sharp 
practice  of  this  kind  would  occasionally  be  good  for  most 
of  us.  We  like  to  have  our  facts  well  in  hand,  ready  for 
instant  use ;  but  if  we  hope  to  remember  much  of  his- 
tory, or  to  make  it  in  any  way  vital  to  us,  we  must  study 
very  differently.  We  must  take  an  epoch  as  a  whole ; 
we  must  learn  about  all  the  great  men  of  the  time,  and 
understand  their  acts ;  we  must  learn  the  geography  of 
the  country,  the  condition  of  its  arts  and  sciences  and 
literature,  until  all  our  study  blends  and  forms  a  living 
whole.  When  we  have  once  studied  an  epoch  in  this 
way,  we  shall  always  remember  the  main  features  of  it ; 
but  we  shall  forget  details,  and  it  would  of  course  be 
impossible  to  go  over  all  the  same  ground  again  and 
again.  It  is  not  even  desirable,  for  many  of  the  details 
we  have  forgotten  were  only  of  use  as  they  served  to 
make  the  whole  picture  more  vivid,  and  other  details 
would  answer  the  purpose  as  well.  So  I  should  say,  that 
if  you  find  yourself  forgetting  the  particulars  of  the  hfe 
of  Washington,  which  you  perhaps  read  in  Mr.  Scudder's 


52       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

little  book  in  the  "Riverside  Library  for  Young  People," 
it  would  be  best  not  to  re-read  that  book,  but  to  take 
up  the  larger  "  Life  "  by  Mr.  Lodge,  where  you  will  have 
the  important  facts  differently  presented  with  some  ad- 
ditional ones ;  the  next  time  you  find  yourself  doubt- 
ful on  these  points,  read  Irving's  "Washington,"  and 
so  on. 

Suppose  you  have  read  a  general  history  of  England. 
It  would  be  a  good  plan  to  take  next  a  general  history 
of  France,  —  for  there  has  been  a  constant  interaction 
between  the  two  countries  for  hundreds  of  years,  —  and 
in  the  story  of  France  you  will  review  the  main  events 
of  the  English  story  from  a  new  sLindpoint. 

And  now  a  word  as  to  dates.  There  are  not  more 
than  twenty  or  thirty  dates  that  it  is  absolutely  necessary 
for  us  to  know ;  but  it  is  often  disgraceful  not  to  know 
the  epoch  in  which  any  event  occurred.  For  instance, 
we  need  not  feel  ourselves  ruined  for  life  if  we  should 
happen  to  think  Columbus  discovered  America  in 
1493,  —  though  I  admit  that  is  one  of  the  mistakes  an 
American  girl  ought  not  to  make ;  but  to  fancy  that  he 
discovered  it  in  1392  or  1592  would  be  fatally  wrong, — 
though  the  figures  themselves  would  be  no  more  askew, 
—  because  such  an  error  would  affect  our  whole  con- 
ception of  the  last  part  of  the  fifteenth  century.  If  we 
know  the  story  of  the  discovery  well,  the  one  date,  1492, 
will  tell  us  a  great  many  things, — that  Ferdinand  and 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  REMEMBER?      53 

Isabella  ruled  Spain  at  that  time,  that  Henry  VIL  was 
then  on  the  throne  of  England,  etc.  If  we  know  how  to 
group  our  facts,  eighteen  dates  will  give  us  approxi- 
mately the  time  of  every  great  event  of  the  Christian 
era. 

I  should  be  willing  to  learn  a  few  dates  artificially ; 
and  I  am  not  one  of  those  who  despise  the  lists  of 
Roman  emperors  and  English  kings.  These  lists  are 
good  pegs  to  hang  miscellaneous  knowledge  upon  until 
we  have  collected  enough  of  it  to  arrange  in  some  or- 
ganic form.  Nevertheless  I  think  we  should  all  beware 
of  often  applying  artificial  stimulants  to  our  memory. 


V. 

HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN   TO  THINK? 

IF  we  have  learned  how  to  observe  in  any  broad 
sense,  and  if  we  have  then  learned  how  to  fix 
essential  facts  in  our  memory,  we  shall  be  already  far  on 
the  way  toward  learning  to  think,  for  in  intelligent 
observation  or  memory  we  must  use  judgment. 

For  example,  we  look  at  a  wild  rose  till  we  know 
every  part  in  detail,  and  then  we  examine  a  strawberry- 
blossom.  If  we  have  made  the  observation  faithfully,  it 
will  not  take  a  teacher  to  tell  us  that  the  two  plants 
belong  to  one  family.  A  spark  of  understanding  will 
flash  across  from  one  set  of  obser\-ations  to  the  other ; 
we  shall  then  be  ready  to  test  the  whole  floral  kingdom 
by  comparing  every  member  of  it  with  a  rose.  Is  this 
flower  like  a  rose,  or  is  it  not?  If  not,  how  does  it 
differ?  One  might  study  botany  on  an  uninhabited 
island  in  this  way,  and  group  plants  naturally,  making 
a  close  approximation  to  the  well-known  written  sys- 
tems. A  lily  is  far  removed  from  a  rose,  and  both  are 
very  different   from  a   dandelion.     Which  of  the   three 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  THINK?  55 

does  a  buttercup  most  resemble  ?  The  first  steps  in  the 
study  of  any  science  are  steps  of  observation,  but  they 
lead  directly  up  to  comparison  and  inference,  and  in 
other  words,  to  judgment. 

Or  suppose  we  are  trying  to  learn  something  of  an 
epoch  in  history,  —  for  instance,  the  French  Revolution. 
We  cannot  even  remember  the  leading  facts  unless  we 
understand  them.  We  must  think  of  the  causes  which 
brought  on  the  Revolution  before  we  can  remember  the 
difference  between  the  Jacobins  and  the  Girondists. 
We  must  consider  the  character  and  circumstances  of 
individual  actors  in  the  drama  before  we  can  remember 
unerringly  the  part  they  took.  Was  Madame  Roland 
a  Jacobin  or  a  Girondist?  The  girls  who  can  answer 
that  question  six  months  after  they  have  read  her  hfe 
will  be  able  to  do  so  because  they  have  thought  about 
her  character  and  have  understood  something  of  her 
relation  to  the  times.  To  remember  essential  things, 
we  must  first  use  our  judgment  in  deciding  what 
are  essential. 

I  have  already  spoken  of  Science  and  History  as 
studies  which  cultivate  respectively  observation  and 
memory ;  but  it  will  be  clear  that  they  both  have  a  far 
higher  use  in  teaching  us  to  think.  The  sciences  which 
are  learned  principally  by  trying  experiments  —  like 
chemistry  and  physics  —  are  especially  of  use  here,  for 
we  always  have   to   ask  ourselves  what  the  experiment 


$6      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

proves?  History  develops  the  power  to  form  a  dif- 
ferent class  of  judgments ;  and  a  broad  study  of  history 
is  indispensable  to  all  who  wish  to  be  able  to  think 
wisely  on  current  affairs. 

For  precision  of  thought  there  is  no  instructor  like 
mathematics,  and  geometry  beyond  all  other  branches 
of  them.  Such  an  overwhelming  majority  of  girls  hate 
mathematics  that  it  is  hard  to  know  just  how  to  persuade 
them  of  its  importance.  I  knew  one  indefatigable 
teacher,  who  used  to  labour  with  each  pupil  in  private 
till  she  had  absolutely  convinced  her  that  she  (the 
pupil)  wanted  to  master  her  mathematics  in  the  most 
complete  and  thorough  way.  This  teacher  not  only  had 
a  beautiful  and  noble  character,  but  possessed  such  sym- 
pathy and  power  of  attraction  that  the  girls'  love  for  her 
probably  formed  a  preponderating  factor  in  their  en- 
thusiasm for  the  study.  At  all  events,  they  yielded,  to 
the  very  last  girl ;  the  most  stupid  one  found  that  she 
could  understand  what  she  had  thought  she  could  not ; 
and  that  wonderful  teacher  set  her  impress  upon  the 
school,  so  that  the  high  standard  in  mathematics  was 
maintained  there  long  after  she  was  in  her  grave.  More 
than  that,  all  her  scholars  carried  out  into  life  the  habit 
of  asking,  "  Why?  "  when  any  new  course  of  thought  or 
action  opened  before  them;  and  '*Why?"  is  one  of 
those  little  words  which  have  a  far-reaching  effect  in 
teaching  us  how  to  think  on  all  subjects. 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  THINK?  57 

Most  people  —  boys  as  well  as  girls  —  are  naturally 
rather  dull  at  mathematics;  but  boys  like  them  better 
than  girls  do,  and  they  are  always  taught  that  practical 
success  in  life  depends  on  knowing  at  least  arithmetic 
well.  Girls  have  practical  need  of  arithmetic,  too, 
though  they  do  not  often  require  quite  as  many  of  its 
technicalities.  But  they  are  tacitly  encouraged  to  in- 
dulge their  dislike,  which  is  usually  extreme,  on  the 
ground  that  they  will  not  need  to  earn  their  living  by 
figures,  though,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  a  great  many  of 
them  are  obliged  to  do  this. 

My  present  plea  for  mathematics,  however,  is  based 
entirely  on  their  importance  in  teaching  precise  thinking. 
I  know  girls'  schools  in  which  they  hold  an  honoured 
place,  and  others  in  which  they  are  virtually  ignored. 
In  the  latter  the  girls  sometimes  have  a  broader  culture 
when  they  leave  school,  but  their  tone  of  mind  is  less 
vigorous,  and  ten  years  later,  the  mathematicians  have 
often  distanced  them  in  general  culture.  Of  course, 
exclusive  devotion  to  mathematics  would  be  narrowing ; 
though  when  they  are  carried  into  the  domains  of 
Chemistry  and  Crystallography,  etc.,  they  do  open  a 
vast  and  splendid  territory  to  the  thinker.  As  I  have 
yet  to  hear  of  the  girls'  school  which  lays  undue  stress 
on  such  study,  I  think  it  safe  to  advise  every  girl  who 
reads  these  pages  to  make  the  most  of  her  opportunities 
in  this  direction.     No  doubt  too  much  precision  is  fatal 


S8       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

to  large  judgments,  but  I  do  not  happen  to  know  any 
girl  who  is  in  danger  of  being  too  precise. 

An  accomplished  lady,  who  during  several  years  had 
taught  the  same  set  of  girls  a  variety  of  subjects,  ranging 
from  mathematics  and  physics  to  botany  and  rhetoric, 
said :  "  It  was  more  delightful  at  the  time  to  take  them 
botanizing  in  the  woods,  or  to  discuss  the  figures  of 
speech,  than  to  drill  them  in  mathematics ;  but  in  look- 
ing back  on  the  work,  the  mathematics  give  me  most 
satisfaction,  for  I  could  see  how  the  minds  of  the  girls 
gained  in  power  from  year  to  year." 

But  as  I  write  my  thoughts  are  often  with  those  girls 
who  have  no  teachers  and  must  learn  their  mathematics 
alone.  This  is  not  always  a  misfortune.  I  am  sorry  to  say 
that  a  great  deal  of  the  confusion  girls  find  in  mathema- 
tics is  due  to  incompetent  primary  teaching.  Advanced 
teachers  are  usually  capable,  but  the  mischief  is  done 
before  the  pupil  comes  into  their  hands.  Now,  a  girl 
who  finds  mathematics  a  puzzle,  and  who  has  no  teacher 
to  help  her,  may  be  excused  for  not  trying  to  do  great 
things  in  this  department ;  but  there  are  two  subjects 
perhaps  within  her  reach.  One  is  mental  arithmetic,  — 
altogether  the  most  important  part  of  arithmetic.  I  do 
not  believe  there  are  many  young  women  twenty  years 
old  who  are  sufficiently  in  earnest  to  study  Warren  Col- 
burn's  ancient  "  Mental  Arithmetic  "  fifteen  minutes  a 
day,  following  his  processes  exactly,  who  could  not  con- 


HOW  SHALL  WE  LEARN  TO  THINK?  59 

quer  the  book  in  six  months,  and  be  the  better  for  it 
ever  afterwards. 

The  other  subject  I  would  recommend  is  geometry, 
for  here  the  reasoning  is  not  so  based  on  arithmetic  and 
algebra  that  ignorance  of  these  will  be  an  insuperable 
obstacle  in  the  path.  Take  any  text-book,  learn  the 
axioms  at  the  beginning,  set  down  the  first  proposition 
with  its  figure  on  paper,  and  then  shut  your  book  and 
see  if  you  do  not  already  know  enough  to  prove  the 
proposition ;  if  not,  you  will  have  to  read  the  proof,  but 
that  is  no  reason  why  you  should  not  try  to  prove  the 
next  proposition  for  yourself.  It  will  be  as  interesting 
as  an  enigma  and  more  productive  of  results.  Of 
course,  if  you  have  no  gift  whatever  for  geometry,  you 
can  easily  stop  at  any  time ;  but  if  you  have  any  natural 
capacity  for  it,  you  will  succeed  with  some  propositions, 
and  you  will  understand  the  proofs  you  are  obliged  to 
read.  When  you  finish  the  book  you  will  know  a  great 
deal  more  of  geometry  than  most  school-graduates  do. 
And  after  such  a  course  you  will  never  be  as  contented 
with  loose  and  vague  arguments  on  any  topic  as  you 
were  before. 

I  have  heard  of  a  man  who  reads  a  new  book  in  the 
following  manner.  He  first  thinks  over  its  subject,  and 
perhaps  puts  down  on  paper  the  headings  of  the  differ- 
ent subdivisions  which  he  believes  ought  to  be  treated. 


6o       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

Then  he  refers  to  the  table  of  contents,  where  of  course 
he  finds  some  points  which  he  has  omitted,  though 
sometimes  perhaps  he  has  taken  a  more  comprehensive 
view  than  the  author.  Then  he  considers  the  question 
to  be  treated  in  each  chapter,  and  settles  in  his  mind  his 
own  opinions  upon  it.  Now,  when  he  reads  the  chapter, 
he  is  prepared  to  judge  whether  his  first  ideas  were 
correct  or  not.  If  the  author  has  anything  to  teach  him, 
he  is  pretty  sure  to  learn  it.  Such  a  plan  of  reading 
would  not  do  for  all  kinds  of  books,  but  is  of  great  use 
in  cases  where  an  appeal  is  made  to  our  judgment.  I 
should  be  veiy  glad  if  some  young  girl  would  try  the 
experiment  with  the  little  volume  I  am  now  writing. 
Let  her  take  the  subject  of  any  chapter  in  the  book,  and 
think  about  t  before  she  reads  it.  Perhaps  her  ideas 
would  be  clearer  if  she  would  write  them  down.  When 
she  reads  the  chapter,  she  may  find  that  she  has  antici- 
pated all  the  good  advice  I  mean  to  give  her,  and  that 
she  positively  disagrees  with  some  of  my  opinions :  she 
will  then  be  all  ready  to  consider  the  opinions  wliich 
those  wiser  than  I  have  expressed  on  the  same  subject  in 
better  books.  Whether  what  I  have  to  say  is  useful  in 
itself  or  not,  the  exercise  will  have  been  useful  to  her 
in  teaching  her  how  to  think. 

It  will  be  still  more  to  the  purpose  if  she  will  try  the 
same  experiment  with  some  masterpiece  of  literature. 
I  remember  an  earnest  young  girl  who  was  interested  in 


HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO  THINK?  6l 

Plato's  "  Dialogues,'*  and  coming  to  the  question,  "  Can 
virtue  be  taught?  "  she  set  herself  the  task  of  writing  a 
composition  on  the  subject.  Of  course  she  was  all  the 
more  able  to  appreciate  the  words  of  Socrates  when  she 
came  to  read  them. 

To  learn  to  think,  we  must  think.  If  we  do  not  know 
how  to  think,  we  must  try  to  think.  Every  day  brings 
experiences  which  ought  to  make  us  ask  ourselves  the 
pregnant  little  questions,  "How?"  and'* Why?"  We 
must  not  grudge  the  strength  and  time  necessary  to 
answer  them  for  ourselves;  but  we  must  answer  them 
humbly.  We  must  hold  ourselves  ready  for  new  light, 
and  be  willing  to  correct  our  judgments  by  comparing 
them  with  those  of  wiser  thinkers.  We  know  books  and 
people  to  be  trusted.  Let  us  go  to  them  for  help,  while 
we  hold  ourselves  free  to  weigh  their  views  in  the  bal- 
ances with  our  own.  This  attitude  of  mind  will,  I  feel, 
do  more  in  teaching  us  to  judge  justly  than  any  special 
study ;  logic  itself  could  hardly  help  us  so  much ;  and 
a  serious  study  of  logic  is  rather  too  difficult  for  most 
young  girls  who  have  to  work  alone,  though  it  seems 
to  me  that  even  the  alphabet  of  the  science  is  worth 
something. 

Still,  there  are  certain  studies  which  are  particularly 
beneficial  to  those  who  are  trying  to  form  the  judgment. 
The  science  of  criticism  is  of  the  greatest  value.  Read 
your  Shakspeare,  for  instance,  not  so  that  you  may  be 


62       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

ready  with  quotations,  but  in  such  a  way  that  you  may 
understand  life  and  character.  Think  of  the  heroes  and 
heroines,  and  try  to  grasp  their  motives  of  action.  Try 
their  deeds  by  the  highest  standards,  and  see  whether 
they  will  meet  the  test.  You  need  not  read  a  single  vol- 
ume of  criticism  to  do  this,  you  must  simply  live  with 
these  great  men  and  women.  Afterwards  you  may  com- 
pare your  thoughts  with  those  of  the  critics,  and  you  will 
fmd  that  others  have  a  wider  horizon  than  yours,  and  that 
with  them  you  can  climb  to  higher  mountain-tops. 

And  then,  for  the  best  thought  one  must  study 
poetry.  Matthew  Arnold  says  that  "  the  essential  part 
of  poetic  greatness  is  the  noble  and  profound  applica- 
tion of  ideas  to  life."  This  is  the  spirit  for  the  study 
of  poetry.  We  must  look  for  the  noble  and  profound 
ideas,  and  endeavour  to  apply  them  to  life.  Perhaps 
most  young  girls  will  find  it  hard  to  do  this  at  first  with- 
out help.  But  does  not  the  most  obscure  among  you 
know  some  one  who  can  help  you  a  little,  if  in  no  other 
way,  at  least  by  suggesting  books  to  read  ?  At  any  rate, 
you  can  begin  with  Shakspeare,  and  you  cannot  help 
being  elevated  by  constant  contact  with  so  grand  a 
mind.  I  heard  a  lady  say  once,  in  speaking  of  an  ac- 
quaintance, **  She  would  be  more  likely  to  know  that  a 
poem  was  a  good  one,  if  she  saw  it  in  a  book  than  if 
she  saw  it  in  a  newspaper  !  "  Now,  you  ought  to  know 
whether  a  poem  gives  you  high  thoughts,  whether  you 


HOW   SHALL  WE   LEARN  TO  THINK?  63 

see  it  in  a  book  or  in  a  newspaper.  But  inasmuch  as 
there  is  more  good  poetry  in  books  than  in  periodicals, 
you  will  learn  discrimination  more  quickly  if  you  spend 
your  time  over  the  great  poets  than  if  you  waste  it  in 
trying  to  sift  the  wheat  from  the  chaff  in  the  daily  news- 
papers,—at  least  at  first.  By-and-by  the  time  will  come 
when  you  will  know  a  fine  thing  in  a  moment  wherever 
you  see  it  by  this  infallible  test,  — it  will  uplift  and 
comfort  you. 


VI. 

THE   STUDY   OF   LANGUAGES. 

I  HOPE  I  have  already  made  it  clear  that  all  study 
should  have  for  its  object  the  enlargement  of  the 
mind  and  the  development  of  the  character.  When  we 
begin  to  consider  the  claims  of  special  studies  our  path  is 
not  always  quite  plain.  I  am  one  of  those  who  believe  in 
the  fullest  possible  education  for  everybody.  To  history, 
literature,  the  sciences,  mathematics,  music,  and  art,  I 
would  gladly  add  as  many  languages  as  the  student  can 
really  master,  provided  —  and  this  is  a  very  important 
stipulation  —  that  nothing  more  important  is  sacrificed, 
—  health,  for  instance,  or  happiness,  or 

"  A  heart  at  leisure  from  itself 
To  soothe  and  sympathize." 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  so  complete  a  curriculum 
is  not  possible  for  most  of  us.  Capacity  and  circum- 
stances decide  what  each  can  do.  Now,  while  I  by  na 
means  despise  the  man  who  "  can  ask  for  gingerbread 
in  twenty  languages,"  I  think  most  of  us  will  not  use  our 
lives  to  the  best  advantage  in  studying  so  many  different 


THE   STUDY   OF   LANGUAGES.  65 

tongues ;  and  I  think  it  would  be  a  real  misfortune  for 
those  young  girls  who  are  trying  to  learn  something 
without  the  aid  of  a  teacher  to  spend  most  of  their  time 
over  languages,  as  I  know  they  are  often  tempted 
to  do. 

There  is  a  story  to  the  point  told  in  the  recent  memo- 
rial, "William  Ellis  and  his  Conduct-Teaching."  As 
Mr.  Ellis's  name  will  not  be  familiar  to  most  girls,  I 
will  say  that  he  was  a  rich  business  man  who  devoted  all 
his  spare  time  and  money  to  the  founding  of  schools 
which  should  make  conduct  the  most  important  branch 
of  study.  He  was  at  one  time  employed  to'  teach  the 
royal  children  of  England,  and  one  of  them,  at  least,  — 
the  present  ex-Empress  of  Gennany,  —  always  held  her 
teacher  in  reverent  remembrance.  He  was  once  con- 
sulted by  a  lady  who  was  looking  for  an  instructor  in 
Spanish,  I  think,  for  her  daughter,  who  had  already 
been  taught  three  or  four  other  languages.  "  I  sup- 
pose your  daughter  understands  astronomy?"  he  asked. 
<'0h,  no."  *' Botany,  perhaps?"  "No."  And  so  he 
continued  his  questions,  always  receiving  a  negative 
answer.  At  last  he  said,  smiling,  "Isn't  it  almost  a* 
pity  to  give  her  another  opportunity  of  advertising  her 
ignorance  ?  " 

The  truth  is,  language  rightly  studied  is  of  the  highest 
value ;  but  as  a  mere  accomplishment,  it  is  one  of  the 
most  barren  of  pursuits.     I  am  very  sorry  to  say  that 

5 


66       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

most  girls  study  the  languages  —  especially  the  modem 
languages  —  to  which  they  are  most  attracted,  chiefly  as 
accomplishments.  Now  we  will  not  be  unfair  even  to 
accomplishments ;  so  let  us  admit  at  once  that  it  is  a 
fine  thing  for  a  girl  to  know  French,  or  German,  or 
Italian  well,  to  speak  it  with  a  perfect  accent,  to  write 
it  fluently  and  correctly,  and  to  read  it  at  sight.  And 
then  let  us  immediately  add  that  such  a  genuine  accom- 
plishment as  that  is  not  only  very  rare,  but  entirely 
impossible,  unless  the  pupil  is  both  rich  and  gifted,  and 
we  all  know  such  a  combination  is  unusual. 

Mr.  Hamerton  says,  in  his  "  Intellectual  Life,"  that  no 
one  can  possibly  learn  more  than  three  languages  per- 
fectly ;  and  that  the  conditions  necessary  for  even  so 
many  are,  that  one  parent  should  be  a  native  of  one 
country,  the  other  of  another,  and  that  the  family  should 
live  in  the  third.  As  a  general  thing,  even  those  who 
live  in  foreign  countries  do  not  speak  two  languages  per- 
fectly. If  they  master  the  new  language  entirely,  they 
find  themselves  forgetting  certain  idioms  of  their  mother- 
tongue. 

So,  to  be  really  accomplished  in  any  language,  we 
must  have  opportunities  which  involve  money.  And  any 
one  who  has  witnessed  the  painful  spectacle  of  the  vast 
numbers  of  girls'  schools  in  which  all  other  education  is 
made  secondary  to  the  study  of  French,  and  who  knows 
how  far  the  pupils  are  in  the  end  from  reading,  writing, 


THE   STUDY   OF   LANGUAGES.  6j 

and  speaking  the  French  language  correctly,  will  not 
need  to  be  told  that  more  than  average  powers  must 
supplement  riches  in  order  that  French  may  be  an  ac- 
complishment. I  dwell  a  little  on  this  point,  because  a 
knowledge  of  French  is  looked  upon  as  one  of  the  hall- 
marks which  distinguish  a  lady;  and  this  is  the  igiiis 
fatuus  which  allures  many  a  poor  girl  to  spend  her  time 
in  trying  to  acquire  it.  I  do  not  wish  to  discourage  the 
study,  but  merely  to  show  just  what  measure  of  success 
is  possible.  A  French  accent,  for  instance,  is  almost  a 
monopoly  of  the  rich ;  though  very  few  of  them  ever  gain 
it,  for  it  can  only  be  caught  by  constantly  hearing  the 
language  spoken  by  cultivated  teachers.  I  sometimes 
think  that  one  reason  the  rich  prize  the  accent  so  much 
is  because  they  have  such  an  advantage  over  the  poor  in 
that  respect,  while  a  clever  student  may  easily  win  the 
honours  for  thoroughness  in  the  grammar  or  literature. 
At  all  events,  they  do  prize  it ;  and  few  teachers  are  so 
unmercifully  criticised  as  those  unlucky  Frenchmen  and 
Frenchwomen  who  are  suspected  of  having  been  brought 
up  anywhere  except  in  the  very  centre  of  the  city  of 
Paris. 

It  will  be  seen  that  I  think  that  any  girl,  and  especially 
any  poor  girl,  should  have  some  better  object  than  to 
become  accomplished,  if  she  undertakes  the  study  of 
French.  The  same  may  be  said  of  other  languages, 
only  most  others  are  pursued  more  earnestly.     Perhaps 


6S       CHATS   WITH    GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

the  fact  that  French  is  the  court  language  of  Europe  has 
attracted  to  it  just  those  people  to  whom  the  surface  is 
everything. 

There  are  those  who  recommend  the  study  of  the 
modern  languages  for  their  practical  use.  Circum- 
stances decide  this  matter.  A  girl  who  is  employed  by 
a  large  merchant  or  manufacturer  having  dealings  in 
South  America,  may  find  it  greatly  to  the  purpose  to 
learn  Spanish.  Having  learned  it  for  its  bread-winning 
value,  she  may  be  able  to  use  it  to  still  better  ends,  — 
for  a  knowledge  of  its  literature,  perhaps,  or  to  help  her 
to  comprehend  the  life  of  nations  so  different  from  her 
own. 

I  know  a  young  lady  who  came  to  the  city  to  study 
something,  —  she  had  not  a  very  distinct  idea  what. 
She  did  not  expect  to  earn  her  living,  but  she  thought 
it  would  be  well  to  study  something  which  might  be  a 
prop  in  time  of  need.  She  began  with  shorthand  ;  but 
finding  it  extremely  irksome,  she  reflected  on  the  re- 
moteness of  the  contingency  which  woulil  lead  her  to 
use  it,  and  determined  to  try  some  language.  She 
found  herself  inclined  toward  Volapiik.  It  seemed  to 
her  that  it  would  be  a  great  thing  to  understand  a  uni- 
versal language.  She  did  not  realize  that  Volapiik  was 
an  artificial  language,  that  could  teach  her  no  more  of 
the  structure  of  language  in  general  than  shorthand 
could,  that  it  had  absolutely  no  literature,  and   that  it 


THE   STUDY  OF   LANGUAGES.  69 

could  do  nothing  to  help  her  understand  other  modes 
of  life.  The  time  may  come  when  Volapiik  will  be  a 
convenient  acquisition  for  a  business  woman,  but  it 
can  never  be  a  means  of  culture  to  anybody ;  while  the 
study  of  any  natural  language  must  expand  the  mind, 
even  if  pursued  for  the  money  it  will  bring. 

In  these  days  we  all  go  abroad,  or  expect  to  go.  Of 
course  it  is  a  convenience  to  understand  the  language 
of  the  countries  we  visit ;  but  this  is  by  no  means 
essential.  One  of  the  most  highly  cultivated  ladies  I 
ever  knew,  having  been  obliged  by  weakness  of  the  eyes 
to  omit  some  branches  from  a  life-long  course  of  study, 
had  decided  she  could  best  spare  the  languages,  and 
beyond  the  rudiments  of  Latin,  learned  when  a  child, 
she  had  only  English  at  her  command.  When  the  time 
came  for  her  to  go  abroad,  she  had  some  misgivings ;  but 
a  year  or  two  later  she  could  exult  in  having  been  all 
over  Europe  and  having  found  English  sufficient  for  her 
needs,  while  she  had  often  succeeded  in  extricating  her 
party  from  difficulties  which  had  baffled  the  linguists  in 
it.  There  are  English-speaking  railway- officials,  and 
clerks,  and  servants  everywhere.  So  it  seems  that  it 
is  hardly  best  to  learn  a  language  simply  for  its  prac- 
tical benefit  unless  we  have  some  definite  plan  for  its 
immediate  use. 

There  are,  however,  other   reasons  for  studying  lan- 
guages which  are  weighty.     It  is  worth  much  to  have  the 


70       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

key  to  any  great  literature.  It  is  true  we  shall  never 
exhaust  English  literature,  and  it  may  appear  superfluous 
to  study  that  of  another  country.  But  if  we  could 
choose  the  masterpieces  of  all  nations,  it  would  be  better 
than  to  spend  our  time  exclusively  upon  the  works  of  one 
nation.  Translations  will  help  us,  but  a  translation  can- 
not completely  take  the  place  of  the  original.  Now  most 
of  us  have  the  capacity  and  the  opportunity  to  study  at 
least  one  language  besides  our  own  thoroughly  enough  to 
be  at  home  in  its  literature,  though  we  must  not  expect 
to  reach  that  degree  of  excellence  without  hard  work. 
If  literature  is  our  aim,  Greek  will  repay  our  labour  better 
than  Latin,  and  German  better  than  any  other  modern 
language.  But  any  of  the  languages  usually  pursued  in 
schools  have  a  noble  literature  to  offer  if  we  are  ready 
to  take  it.  I  have  great  sympathy  with  those  scholars 
who  learn  Italian  simply  for  the  sake  of  entering  more 
fully  into  the  spirit  of  Dante. 

There  is  another  point  of  view  from  which  the  study 
of  languages,  and  particularly  of  the  classics,  is  still  more 
important.  True  culture  ought  to  raise  us  above  the 
circumstances  of  our  own  narrow  lives.  If  we  always 
look  at  things  from  our  own  standpoint,  we  are  sure  to 
confuse  the  essential  and  the  accidental ;  consequently  it 
is  of  the  greatest  value  to  us  to  bring  ourselves  into  a 
position  far  removed  from  our  own,  to  see  the  world  if 
we  can  with  the  eyes  of  one  of  a  different   race   and 


THE  STUDY  OF  LANGUAGES.  7 1 

time ;  and  while  all  history  and  literature  will  help  us  to 
do  this,  a  foreign  language,  and  especially  a  dead  lan- 
guage, helps  us  more  than  anything  else,  —  for  the  very 
words  (the  names  of  utensils  or  of  the  parts  of  the 
dress)  stand  for  something  unfamiliar  in  our  daily  lives, 
and  a  translation,  however  useful,  lessens  the  effect  by 
bringing  everything  a  little  nearer  our  own  standards. 
Dr.  W.  T.  Harris,  our  U.  S.  Commissioner  of  Education, 
in  a  powerful  paper  on  the  "  Function  of  the  study  of 
Latin  and  Greek  in  Education  "  says,  "  It  will  be  acknowl- 
edged without  dispute  that  modem  civilization  is  deriva- 
tive, resting  upon  the  ancient  Roman  civilization  on  the 
one  hand,  and  on  Greek  civilization  on  the  other."  And 
he  argues  that  the  education  of  a  child  should  lead  him 
to  understand  the  elements  of  his  own  complex  being. 
So  he  must  find  "  one  after  the  other  the  threads  that 
compose  his  civilization,  —  threads  that  weave  the  tissue 
of  his  own  nature  as  a  product  of  civilization." 

This  paper  has  been  given  to  the  Bureau  of  Educa- 
tion for  distribution,  and  deserves  to  be  read  by  every 
student. 

I  do  not  suppose  young  girls  who  are  just  beginning  to 
study  any  language  can  appreciate  just  how  it  is  going  to 
influence  them ;  but  I  should  be  glad  if  what  I  have  said 
might  lead  some  of  them  to  work  with  a  more  serious 
aim  than  to  chatter  about  the  weather  in  some  foreign 
city.     For  I  believe  that  every  girl  should  learn  some 


72       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

language  besides  her  own  for  the  sake  of  the  right  men- 
tal balance.  No  one  has  a  very  clear  idea  of  the  struc- 
ture of  English  who  has  not  made  some  attempt  to 
understand  another  language. 

Pronunciation  and  conversation  cannot  be  learned 
without  a  teacher;  but  something  can  be  done  in 
grammar  and  translation  by  persistent  work  alone.  And 
at  some  time  or  other,  the  poorest  of  us  is  sure  to  find 
some  one  who  is  glad  to  teach  us  something.  I  have 
heard  of  a  young  girl  who  spends  ten  or  twelve  hours  a 
day  in  the  ill-lighted  package-room  of  a  raihoad  station 
and  who  yet  had  the  energy  to  begin  the  study  of  French 
by  herself.  The  pronunciation  puzzled  her,  and  at  last 
she  took  courage  to  ask  some  questions  about  it  of 
another  young  girl  —  a  pupil  in  a  fashionable  school  — 
who  was  in  the  habit  of  leaving  her  books,  among  which 
the  French  books  were  conspicuous,  in  the  package- 
room.  The  latter  was  delighted.  "Oh,  Mamma,*' 
she  exclaimed,  the  moment  she  reached  home,  "  I  have 
found  somebody  I  can  help  !  Even  my  French  is  actually 
going  to  do  mc  some  good."  And  so  she  went  on  help- 
ing the  solitary  student  a  little  every  day. 

I  should  do  my  duty  very  ill  in  this  chapter  if  I  did 
not  say  that  our  own  language  deserves  our  study  above 
all  others.  \VTien  I  hear  that  a  young  lady  speaks  French 
or  German  as  well  as  she  does  English,  I  always  find 
myself  wondering  how  well  she  speaks  English.     English 


THE  STUDY  OF  LANGUAGES.  73 

seems  to  be  within  reach  of  us  all,  and  yet  most  of  us 
must  blush  to  acknowledge  how  imperfectly  we  have 
mastered  it.     How  can  we  do  better? 

We  are  taught  the  rudiments  of  the  language  in  school, 
and  there  are  many  admirable  little  books  on  words  and 
their  uses  which  may  be  of  service ;  but  we  are  often 
contented  to  pick  up  our  English  from  the  people  about 
us,  and  we  copy  their  faults  as  well  as  their  virtues.  Here 
are  a  few  suggestions  for  those  who  have  already  mas- 
tered the  familiar  text-books  on  grammar  and  rhetoric  : 

1.  Read  the  best  writers. 

Those  who  have  the  best  things  to  say  do  not  always 
say  them  in  the  most  polished  English ;  but  a  book  does 
not  become  a  classic  unless  its  ideas  are  clearly  and 
forcibly  expressed.  You  may  not  consciously  pay  any 
attention  to  the  language  of  the  book  you  are  reading, 
but  you  catch  its  tone,  just  as  you  do  that  of  a  living 
companion. 

2.  In  speaking  or  writing,  try  to  make  your  meaning 
clear,  and  take  pains  to  choose  the  best  word  to  express 
an  idea. 

These  two  suggestions  seem  to  me  most  important ; 
but  for  those  who  have  time  and  inclination,  I  think 
a  daily  exercise  in  writing  English  simply  for  practice 
is  valuable.  It  may  take  the  form  of  a  diary,  —  not 
a  sentimental  one,  I  hope,  but  one  recording  the  most 
interesting  events  of  every  day.     We  may  write  a  report 


74       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

of  lectures,  or  an  abstract  of  the  books  we  are  reading. 
Another  useful  exercise  is  to  translate  a  few  paragraphs 
of  some  other  language  into  idiomatic  English,  working 
over  every  sentence  till  we  are  sure  we  have  rendered 
the  exact  idea  in  the  very  best  way. 

I  once  knew  a  young  girl  whose  father,  a  clergyman 
with  a  large  correspondence,  employed  her  as  an  aman- 
uensis. He  gave  her  the  substance  of  the  letters  she 
was  to  write,  but  she  was  obliged  to  use  her  own  words. 
"  When  I  used  to  read  the  letters  to  him,"  she  said,  "  he 
always  asked  me  if  I  could  not  express  the  same  thing 
more  briefly.  So  I  have  learned  to  write  concisely,  but  1 
have  no  grace." 

I  doubt  whether  grace  can  be  directly  cultivated.  Still, 
if  we  should  try  to  say  ever}'thing  pleasantly  as  well  as 
forcibly,  I  fancy  that  however  concise  we  might  be  we 
should  never  be  abrupt;  moreover,  there  is  a  certain 
grace  in  simplicity. 


VII. 

THE  CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY. 

WHY  is  it  that  girls  care  so  much  for  accomplish- 
ments? Partly,  I  fear,  for  the  sake  of  making 
something  of  a  figure  in  the  world ;  but  partly  also,  I  am 
sure,  because  any  true  accomplishment,  like  music  or  art 
or  dancing  or  horticulture,  or  even  embroidery,  adds  so 
much  to  the  beauty  of  life,  and  may  give  so  much  enjoy- 
ment not  only  to  ourselves  but  to  our  friends,  —  though 
unfortunately  most  accomplishments  are  not  used  as  un- 
selfishly as  we  might  wish  them  to  be,  which  perhaps 
only  means  that  very  few  of  us  really  are  accomplished ; 
that  is,  we  are  always  working  up  to  the  point  where  we 
can  begin  to  use  our  acquisitions  for  the  delight  of 
others,  who  would  not  be  at  all  delighted  if  called  upon 
to  share  our  gifts  in  their  present  imperfect  state. 

Uneducated  girls  are  apt  to  overrate  the  effect  of 
accomplishments,  not  understanding  how  few  people 
possess  any.  I  have  already  shown  how  rare  it  is  to  have 
a  good  command  of  French.  In  Mr.  Howells's  story, 
"A  Woman's  Reason,"  Helen  Harkness  is  described  as 


'■J6       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

having  received  the  best  education  which  money  could 
buy,  and  yet  when  she  tried  to  think  of  a  means  of  self- 
support,  she  found  her  knowledge  of  music  and  art  and 
the  languages  altogether  too  superficial  for  the  purpose. 
It  is  true  we  do  not  wish  for  accomplishments  for  the 
sake  of  earning  our  living  ;  but  unless  they  go  deep  enough 
to  make  that  possible,  we  may  have  a  right  to  wonder 
whether  they  deserve  to  be  called  accomplishments.  A 
real  accomphshment  involves  intellect. 

But  suppose  we  never  can  sing  or  draw  or  dance  well, 
is  that  any  reason  for  not  doing  the  best  we  can?  Not 
if  we  keep  our  eyes  steadily  turned  in  the  right  direction. 
If  we  love  beauty,  we  must  wish  to  do  all  we  can  to  make 
our  own  little  corner  beautiful.  We  may  not  succeed  in 
producing  beauty  ourselves,  but  every  attempt  we  make 
helps  us  to  see  beauty,  and  even  to  show  it  to  others.  A 
selfish  girl  will  hope  that  no  one  will  detect  her  false 
notes  in  singing  ;  an  unselfish  girl  will  rejoice  that  others 
have  a  tmer  ear  than  her  own. 

I  could  never  feel  with  Keats  that  beauty  and  truth 
are  identical ;  yet  in  the  highest  sense  this  must  be  tnie, 
and  beauty  is  one  of  the  great  essentials  of  life.  No  one 
can  be  making  the  "  most  of  the  stuff"  who  docs  not 
love  beauty  more  and  more  as  time  goes  on.  And  so  I 
should  like  every  girl  to  try  to  become  accomplished ; 
only  let  her  be  sure  that  she  docs  it  for  love  of  beauty 
and  not  for  love  of  herself. 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   77 

I  cannot  tell  a  girl  how  to  become  a  musician  or  an 
artist.  If  she  has  such  an  aim  she  must  have  special 
teachers ;  and  even  then  she  will  not  succeed  unless  Nature 
has  given  her  some  power.  But  so  far  as  culture  and 
character  go,  the  love  of  beauty  is  more  important 
than  the  ability  to  create  it.  How  can  we  nourish  this 
love? 

Most  of  us  are  blind  to  some  forms  of  beauty.  Per- 
haps we  are  carried  out  of  ourselves  by  fine  music,  but 
hardly  know  the  difference  between  a  fine  picture  and  a 
daub.  A  sunset  moves  us,  but  the  greatest  poetry  tires 
us.     How  can  we  help  ourselves  ? 

Now  only  those  who  can  themselves  draw  or  paint  or 
work  in  clay  can  really  criticise  a  work  of  art,  though 
one  who  has  keen  powers  of  observation  with  the  neces- 
sary mental  grasp  can  form  some  judgment  of  its  merits. 
I  cannot  teach  anybody  to  be  a  critic.  Yet  shall  we  not 
all  try  to  see  the  little  we  can  see  of  every  kind  of 
beauty?  Though  I  cannot  speak  with  authority,  I  feel 
inclined  to  say  something  about  the  study  of  art,  for  my 
experience  leads  me  to  think  that  untaught  girls  are  less 
awake  to  the  real  meaning  of  paintings  and  statuary  than 
to  most  other  forms  of  beauty,  —  especially  in  this  country, 
where  outside  of  a  few  large  cities  there  is  no  oppor- 
tunity whatever  to  see  good  models.  Indeed  few  Amer- 
icans know  anything  of  art.  Those  we  call  cultivated 
simply  know  about  it,  —  the  great  names,  the  schools,  the 


78       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

galleries  where  the  famous  pictures  are  to  be  found,  etc. 
Even  so  much  is  very  pleasant,  but  it  has  no  deep 
foundation. 

Mrs.  Oliphant  has  brought  out  this  distinction  clearly 
in  "Agnes."  Agnes  was  the  daughter  of  a  blacksmith,  a 
man  of  high  character,  refined  feeling,  and  good  intellect. 
She  was  like  her  father,  and  had  all  the  instincts  of  a 
lady.  She  married  a  man  of  station,  who  appeared  to 
be  her  superior,  but  who  was  so  only  in  externals.  He 
took  her  to  Italy,  and  she  began  to  know  his  friends.  The 
pictures  entirely  bewildered  her.  She  loved  all  kinds  of 
beauty.  Nature  or  the  best  poetry  touched  her  far  more 
deeply  than  it  did  any  one  else  in  that  English  colony. 
She  was  even  able  to  respond  to  music  as  she  ought,  but 
she  could  never  say  the  right  thing  about  a  picture.  Now 
it  was  not  true  that  most  of  her  husband's  friends  really 
saw  more  than  she  did  ;  they  simply  knew  what  they 
were  expected  to  see  and  despised  her  for  not  knowing. 

Few  persons  do  see  what  is  to  be  seen,  and  so  long  as 
a  foolish  vanity  makes  them  wish  to  appear  as  if  they  did 
see,  no  progress  is  possible.  Not  long  ago  I  had  the 
pleasure  of  passing  an  afternoon  in  the  studio  of  an  artist 
who  has  just  returned  to  this  country  after  living  many 
years  abroad.  In  speaking  of  the  different  atmosphere 
for  work  here  and  in  Europe,  he  said  that  America  was 
disheartening,  because  no  one  seemed  to  care  to  find  out 
what  an  artist  was  trying  to  do.     "  Bostonians,"  he  said. 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   79 

"would  seldom  hazard  any  praise  for  fear  of  praising 
the  wrong  thing.  New  Yorkers,"  he  added  with  frank 
simplicity,  "  are  even  more  ignorant  than  Bostonians ;  but 
they  have  a  more  genial  effect  on  an  artist,  for  they  will 
admire  freely,  not  being  so  conceited  nor  so  afraid  of 
making  a  mistake  !  " 

An  able  New  York  critic  said  to  a  friend  of  mine, 
"  When  you  look  at  a  picture,  do  not  say,  '  I  like  it,'  or 
'  I  don't  like  it,'  at  first ;  but  try  to  see  what  there  is 
in  it." 

All  artists  mean  to  express  the  beauty  they  themselves 
see.  It  may  be  very  little,  and  they  may  not  succeed  in 
expressing  even  that.  If  they  fail  in  expression,  our 
study  will  be  barren,  though  it  may  perhaps  teach  us 
something  of  the  value  of  technique.  But  if  they  have 
expressed  even  a  little  beauty,  it  will  often  be  just  that 
which  we  should  not  have  seen  without  their  help,  for 
every  artist  must  emphasize  that  part  of  the  beauty  of 
the  universe  which  comes  within  his  own  range  of  vision, 
and  the  universe  is  so  vast  that  no  one  sees  it  all.  One 
artist  has  an  eye  for  colour,  one  for  form,  another  for  life 
and  action,  another  still  sees  through  the  dull  and  faded 
features  of  common  faces  to  the  soul  beyond,  and  their 
pictures  silently  help  us  to  see  the  same  things  as  if  a 
friend  stood  at  our  side  and  pointed  them  out. 

If  we  try  to  see  what  there  is  in  a  picture,  I  do  not 
think  our  time  is  quite  wasted,  even  if  we  study  poor 


80       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

ones.  If  there  is  nothing  there  —  or  nothing  for  us  —  we 
shall  soon  find  it  out.  Still,  we  want  the  best  from  the 
very  beginning  to  supply  us  with  standards  of  excellence. 
Let  us  at  least  study  what  we  believe  to  be  the  best 
within  our  reach.  In  Boston,  for  instance,  we  know  that 
the  Art  Museum  is  full  of  objects  worth  seeing.  The 
pictures  are  not  as  good  as  the  statuary ;  and  if  we  have 
no  friend  to  guide  us,  perhaps  the  best  thing  we  can  do 
is  to  begin  with  the  sculptures  of  the  Parthenon,  which 
we  know  to  belong  to  the  most  perfect  period  of  Greek 
art. 

But  suppose  we  want  to  look  at  pictures.  I  think  it 
would  be  a  good  plan  to  spend  an  hour  some  day  in  a 
single  room,  looking  at  each  painting  and  trying  to  find 
out  its  value.  Then,  having  made  our  first  crude  obser- 
vations, let  us  ask  the  one  among  our  friends  who  knows 
most  of  art  what  he  thinks  on  these  points.  Or,  if  we 
have  seen  something  by  a  famous  artist,  we  may  read 
about  him,  and  even  if  we  do  not  meet  with  any  expHcit 
criticism  of  the  painting  we  have  been  examining,  we  are 
sure  to  find  some  estimate  of  the  qualities  belonging  to 
his  work  in  general.  Now  we  can  return  to  the  pictures 
themselves,  and  see  whether  we  arc  incHned  to  hold  to 
our  first  judgment. 

It  is  not  best  to  look  at  many  works  of  art  at  once. 
We  do  not  fairly  see  them.  But  the  dullest  of  us  can 
usually  find   something  of  worth  if  we   will  take  time. 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   8 1 

For  example,  among  the  reproductions  of  certain  reliefs 
from  the  tomb  of  Ti,  in  the  first  Egyptian  room  of  the 
Boston  Art  Museum,  is  one  in  which  the  careless  girl 
would  notice  simply  a  few  cattle  with  their  drivers,  and 
she  would  probably  then  pass  on  to  the  next.  I  cannot 
say  what  the  hieroglyphics  of  the  panel  may  mean.  It 
may  be  that  they  tell  the  whole  story.  But  you  can  dis- 
cover it  for  yourself.  If  you  will  stand  before  the  sculp- 
ture for  a  few  minutes,  you  will  notice  that  one  of  the 
men  is  carrying  a  calf  on  his  shoulders,  —  a  pitiful,  anx- 
ious calf,  which  is  turning  its  head  backward.  Next  in 
order  follow  three  cows,  and  you  can  instantly  pick  out 
the  mother  of  the  calf  by  the  distress  in  her  attitude. 
Now,  you  may  not  call  this  work  of  some  long- dead 
Egyptian  beautiful,  but  it  is  touching ;  and  even  a  young 
girl  who  knows  nothing  of  Egyptian  history  would  feel  a 
thrill  of  kinship  with  that  ancient  people  when  she  had 
found  out  the  meaning  of  this  representation  for  herself. 
Those  of  us  who  have  no  natural  taste  for  art  are  in  great 
danger  of  depending  on  the  title  of  a  picture  for  its 
meaning  and  not  on  the  picture  itself.  This  is  what  art- 
ists condemn  as  judging  a  picture  from  a  literary  point 
of  view.  I  suppose,  for  that  matter,  that  all  of  us  who 
have  not  been  taught  correct  drawing  and  colouring  must 
inevitably  judge  pictures  largely  from  a  literary  point  of 
view ;  but  if  we  only  find  some  real  beauty  in  them,  that 
is  better  than  nothing.  v^  l^  a   t 

6   ^^\h 


82       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

In  New  York  the  Metropolitan  Museum  is  open  to 
everybody.  In  Washington,  in  St.  Louis,  and  in  many 
other  large  cities  there  are  collections  accessible  to  the 
public  containing  at  least  some  works  of  undoubted  ex- 
cellence which  a  beginner  might  study  with  a  certainty 
of  being  repaid.  There  are  thousands  of  country  girls 
all  over  the  United  States  who  are  in  the  habit  of  going 
into  these  cities  several  times  a  year  at  least  to  do  shop- 
ping, and  if  they  chose  to  give  even  an  hour  of  their 
busy  day  to  the  best  art  to  be  had  in  the  city,  —  not 
merely  a  hasty  glance  to  the  latest  exhibition  in  an  art- 
dealer's  rooms,  —  they  would  find  that  their  power  of 
appreciating  the  best  slowly  increased  from  year  to  year. 
Of  course  the  girls  who  live  in  these  cities  hive  a  hun- 
dred times  better  opportunity.     Do  they  use  it  ? 

A  few  years  ago  there  was  a  genuine  Raphael  in  the 
Metropolitan  Museum, — the  Madonna  of  the  Candela- 
brum. How  many  New  York  girls  of  leisure  took  the 
pains  to  study  it? 

But  though  thousands  of  girls  might  look  at  these  fine 
collections  if  they  would,  there  are  a  million  at  least  in 
the  United  States  who  have  no  access  to  anything  of  the 
kind.  What  can  such  girls  do?  Not  much,  but  some- 
thing. It  is  now  easy  to  get  really  good  unmounted 
photographs  of  most  of  the  great  pictures  of  the  world. 
Those  who  cannot  find  them  nearer  can  always  send  to 
the  Soule  Photograph  Co.,  338  Washington  Street,  Bos- 


CULTIVATION   OF  THE   LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.      83 

ton.  If  a  club  could  be  formed  in  any  town  or  even  in 
two  or  three  adjoining  towns,  so  that  by  the  payment  of 
a  small  fee  twenty  or  thirty  dollars'  worth  of  photographs 
could  be  bought  every  year,  and  the  members  would 
study  these,  it  would  not  be  long  before  they  would  know 
more  about  pictures  than  most  people  who  are  called 
cultivated,  and  if  they  faithfully  looked  for  the  best  in 
every  picture  they  would  gradually  learn  to  find  it. 

Those  who  cannot  afford  to  buy  even  photographs  may 
be  able  to  borrow  such  as  illustrate  particular  artists  and 
schools  from  the  Art  Department  of  the  "Study  At 
Home  Society,"  41   Marlborough  Street,  Boston. 

Then  suppose  we  look  also  for  the  material  for  pictures. 
In  the  most  obscure  circle  there  is  always  some  wrinkled 
woman  with  a  sweet  mouth,  or  some  toil-worn  man  with 
clear  eyes,  who  may  give  to  us  the  same  elevation  of 
thought  that  we  get  most  easily  from  a  work  of  art. 

I  heard  a  cultivated  lady  say  once,  "  I  never  cared 
much  for  Nature  till  after  I  had  studied  paintings."  This 
is  a  curious  reversal  of  the  true  order  of  things.  You 
see,  however,  it  is  true  that  the  artists  who  work  sincerely 
do  show  us  what  most  of  us  are  slow  to  find  without 
them ;  yet  if  we  have  the  determination,  we  can  find  the 
beauty  for  ourselves,  and  that  is  better  than  to  know  all 
the  galleries  of  Europe  by  heart. 

In  the  study  of  painting  or  sculpture  or  architecture 
books  will  sometimes  help  us,  —  not  of  course  to  produce. 


84       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

but  to  appreciate.  I  once  heard  a  distinguished  librarian 
say  in  answer  to  some  one  who  had  asked  for  a  list  of 
such  books,  "  Begin  with  Kugler."  The  half-dozen  small 
illustrated  volumes  of  Kugler's  ''  Hand-book  of  Painting  " 
would  probably  take  a  girl  further  than  most  works  which 
are  equally  accessible  on  the  way  to  just  views  about 
pictures. 

For  those  girls  who  expect  to  study  the  pictures  of 
Italy  at  first  hand  there  is  probably  no  guide  to  compare 
with  Burckhardt's  "  Cicerone."  Passavant's  illustrated 
**  Life  of  Raphael  "  is  of  great  service  to  those  who  stay 
at  home ;  and  there  are  other  illustrated  lives  of  the 
artists,  —  particularly  Black's  "  Michael  Angelo,"  Crowe 
and  Cavalcaselle's  *'  Titian,"  the  "  Leonardo  da  Vinci  " 
and  "  Albert  DUrer  "  of  Mrs.  Heaton,  and  her  translation 
of  Meyer's  "  Correggio,"  —  which  are  of  value. 

If  you  wish  to  know  something  of  sculpture,  no  single 
work  will  give  you  a  clearer  and  more  trustworthy  outline 
of  the  subject  than  Mrs.  Lucy  M.  Mitchell's  "  History  of 
Ancient  Sculpture."  It  has  the  merit  of  being  more 
entertaining  than  many  standard  works,  and  better  than 
all,  the  illustrations  are  unusually  fine,  even  the  wood- 
engravings  being  artistic.  A  supplementary  portfolio  of 
twenty  phototype  plates,  entitled  "  Selections  from  An- 
cient Sculpture,"  may  be  used  for  further  illustration  by 
those  of  you  who  can  afford  such  a  work.  Mrs.  Mitchell 
has  a  special  power  in  describing  a  work  of  art  in  few 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   85 

words  which  help  a  beginner  to  see  where  its  real  value 
lies,  so  that  her  descriptions  taken  in  connection  with 
her  illustrations  are  a  true  education  for  the  reader. 

But  in  this  chapter  I  am  less  concerned  to  show  how 
we  may  learn  about  works  of  art  than  how  we  may 
actually  see  what  they  mean.  We  want  to  enter  into  the 
life  of  others  far  away,  and  under  all  disguises.  We  look, 
for  instance,  at  such  casts  as  those  of  Lincoln  Cathedral 
in  the  Art  Museum  in  Boston,  and  we  hastily  say  they  are 
grotesque  and  not  beautiful.  Yet  if  we  look  a  little 
longer  at  some  of  those  queer  angels  perched  up  in  pain- 
ful positions,  while  they  twang  their  antiquated  musical 
instruments,  we  begin  to  see  in  their  blissful  smiles  a  hint 
of  the  aspiring  souls  within. 

But  while  we  try  to  see  the  beauty  we  are  sure  there 
must  be  in  any  masterpiece  which  has  stood  the  test  of 
centuries,  let  us  never  pretend  to  find  what  we  do  not 
find.  Let  us  not  be  ashamed  of  our  ignorance,  and  let 
us  express  our  judgments  with  entire  simplicity  and 
modesty. 

I  think  sometimes  that  those  who  are  totally  unin- 
structed  have  a  better  chance  than  those  who  have  had 
generations  of  culture,  because  they  have  no  false  theories 
to  mislead  them.  Our  Puritan  ancestors  sternly  set 
beauty  aside,  and  a  great  many  of  us  were  accordingly 
born  without  an  eye  for  colour  or  an  ear  for  harmony. 
That  is  a  great  loss ;  but  if  we  inherit  the  sincerity  of 


S6      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

our  forefathers,  it  may  help  us  more  to  catch  the  divine 
meaning  in  any  form  of  art  than  a  quick  eye  or  a  sensitive 
ear. 

How  shall  those  of  us  not  specially  endowed  learn  to 
love  the  most  beautiful  music  ?  By  hearing  it,  of  course. 
It  is  on  this  principle  that  all  the  private  schools  in 
Boston  close  early  on  Fridays  so  that  the  young  scholars 
may  spend  their  afternoon  at  the  Symphony  Rehearsal. 

I  heard  a  young  lady  say  not  long  ago,  "  I  have  had  to 
go  to  the  Symphony  Concerts  ever  since  they  were 
founded.  I  used  to  think  they  were  tedious,  and  beg  to 
stay  at  home ;  but  my  father  said  that  if  I  could  not 
appreciate  such  music,  I  must  learn  to  appreciate  it,  and 
now  it  seems  the  most  beautiful  thing  in  the  world."  I 
do  not  think  such  heroic  measures  would  succeed  in  all 
cases ;  and  at  all  events  it  is  not  possible  for  every  girl  in 
the  land  to  go  to  a  Symphony  Concert  every  Friday 
afternoon.  Even  in  Boston,  as  the  speculators  buy  most 
of  the  seats,  such  an  education  is  out  of  the  reach  of 
most  poor  girls.  Very  well.  Then  hear  the  best  music 
which  is  within  reach.  If  you  cannot  hear  Beethoven, 
some  one  in  your  own  village  may  be  able  to  sing  hymns 
sweetly.  Ask  this  friend  to  sing  to  you  often.  If  you 
practise  music  yourself,  do  not  think  a  false  note  is  of  no 
consequence ;  and  do  not  beg  your  teacher  to  give  you 
something  showy  when  you  might  learn  something  noble. 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   8/ 

Few  of  my  readers  will  be  so  far  away  from  music  that 
sometime  they  might  not  hear  a  thoroughly  good  con- 
cert if  they  would  go  without  a  ribbon  or  two  for  the 
sake  of  it.  Only  the  musical  will  get  the  full  meaning  of 
music  ;  but  all  of  us  have  a  deep  need  of  all  we  can  get, 
and  something  is  within  the  reach  of  every  one  who 
longs  for  it. 

Some  years  ago,  when  in  England,  an  attractive  Amer- 
ican girl  said  to  me,  with  a  mortified  air,  "  I  will  never 
own  it  to  the  English,  but  it  is  true  that  we  Americans 
have  dreadful  voices,  just  as  they  say  we  have.  Only 
hear  my  sister's  tone  across  this  room  ! " 

Now  we  must  admit  that  few  of  us  have  really  sweet 
voices ;  and  yet  if  we  love  beauty,  and  especially  beauti- 
ful music,  we  must  wish  to  do  what  we  can  to  make  our 
voices  musical.  I  have  sometimes  thought  this  was 
impossible  unless  we  could  have  an  exceptionally  fine 
vocal  teacher,  and  that  is  beyond  the  reach  of  most  of 
us ;  but  I  have  lately  seen  some  very  practical  sugges- 
tions on  this  subject  in  a  little  book  on  "  Our  Mother 
Tongue  "  by  Mr.  Theodore  Mead,  which  I  am  pretty  sure 
would  help  any  girl  who  would  faithfully  follow  them. 

Whether  sweet  voices  are  possible  to  us  or  not,  it  is 
in  our  power  to  cuhivate  gentle  and  pure  speech.  I 
doubt  whether  there  is  any  more  genuine  accomplish- 
ment than  this,  or  one  which  on  the  whole  gives  more 
refined  pleasure  to  those  about  us,  though  it  is  not  showy. 


88       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

Clear  enunciation  and  perfect  but  easy  pronunciation 
are  marks  of  a  lady  hardly  to  be  mistaken.  To  reach 
this  standard  care  and  thought  and  practice  are  neces- 
sary. And  there  are  many  books  to  help  us.  Among 
the  dictionaries  we  shall  probably  find  "  Worcester  "  most 
useful.  "  Our  Mother  Tongue,"  which  I  have  already 
mentioned,  contains  in  small  compass  more  available 
information  than  any  other  book  I  am  acquainted  with. 
And  as  several  girls  in  earnest  can  learn  more  than 
one  can  learn  alone,  I  should  like  to  suggest  that  some 
of  you  who  are  aware  that  your  manner  of  speaking  is 
not  all  you  desire  it  to  be  should  form  a  little  club  for 
improving  not  only  your  voices,  but  your  pronunciation, 
and  that  you  should  begin  by  practising  together  from 
Mr.  Mead's  vocabulary. 

When  you  become  mistress  of  this  accomplishment, 
you  will  be  able  to  add  something  to  the  pleasure  of  many 
a  friend  who  laughs  at  your  paintings  and  votes  your 
music  a  bore. 

The  love  of  flowers  is  a  natural  endowment  of  almost 
every  girl.  Their  beauty  is  so  simple  and  so  common  that 
no  one  need  be  shut  out  from  it.  If  a  woman  studies 
botany,  she  learns  to  find  a  thousand  delicate  wild  blos- 
soms which  she  would  not  otherwise  have  seen.  If  she 
must  stay  at  home,  as  so  many  women  must,  she  can 
often  have  her  own  little  garden,  or  at  least  a  stand  of 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   89 

pLints  in  her  window,  and  by  cultivating  them  actually 
bear  her  part  in  the  creation  of  beauty.  Few  are  too 
poor  or  too  busy  to  miss  altogether  the  gentle  ministra- 
tions of  flowers ;  but  some  women  fail  to  catch  the  true 
spirit  of  them  after  all.  I  know  a  fine  woman  who  is  a 
botanist.  She  can  give  the  scientific  name  of  every 
flower  in  the  county.  She  has  an  immense  herbarium, 
and  will  — 

"prose 
O'er  books  of  travelled  seamen. 
And  show  you  slips  of  all  that  grows 
From  England  to  Van  Diemen." 

She  is  to  me  a  very  interesting  woman ;  her  knowledge 
is  accurate  and  thorough,  and  her  study  has  scientific 
value  as  well  as  being  an  innocent  and  healthful  recrea- 
tion. But  I  have  never  once  heard  her  say  of  a  flower, 
"  How  beautiful  it  is  !  "  A  friend  of  hers  who  knows 
nothing  of  botany  cultivates  a  bright,  sweet  garden. 
The  botanist  is  inclined  to  look  down  on  the  horticultur- 
ist and  think  she  knows  nothing  of  flowers.  But  is  it 
not  better  to  see  their  beauty  than  to  know  their  names? 
Yet  I  have  known  a  woman  who  successfully  cultivated 
the  most  exquisite  plants  who  said,  "  I  would  not  have 
flowers  at  all  if  I  could  not  have  finer  ones  than  any  one 
else  in  the  village."  She  did  have  finer  ones  than  any 
one  else  in  the  village ;  but  it  is  certain  that  she  did  not 
love  their  beauty,  for  then  she  must  have  wished  every 
garden  in  the  place  to  be  fragrant  with  it. 


90       CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

The   love   of  flowers   is  a  part  of  the  great  love  of 
Nature.     Nature  is  freely  given  to  all  of  us. 

"June  may  be  had  by  the  poorest  comer." 

I  do  not  believe  there  is  any  girl  who  will  read  these 
pages  who  has  not  felt  the  thrill  of  the  spring  woods  or 
the  autumn  sunsets  or  the  starry  sky;  but  there  are  a 
great  many  girls  who  take  very  little  time  to  look  at  these 
things.  They  sit  over  their  crochet  work  when  the  twi- 
light sky  is  flushed  with  rose  and  violet  and  the  great 
planets  are  shedding  their  golden  light  through  the  veil 
of  colour,  and  think  it  is  provoking  that  it  is  growing  dark. 
On  the  rocks  by  the  seashore  they  read  a  flimsy  novel.  I 
am  afraid  most  of  us  must  remember  beautiful  scenes 
which  we  have  made  commonplace  —  and  worse  —  by 
gossiping  conversation.  The  trouble  with  us  is  not  that 
we  cannot  feel  beauty,  nor  that  it  is  not  lying  all  about 
us,  but  that  we  are  not  willing  to  choose  it  before  the 
trivialities  which  interpose  to  hide  it  from  us.  I  do  not 
mean,  of  course,  that  we  are  not  to  laugh  or  talk  in  the 

open  air; 

"  Is  this  a  time  to  be  gloomy  and  sad 
When  our  Mother  Nature  laughs  around  ?  " 

I  do  mean,  that  we  ought  to  take  the  time  to  see  the 
glory  of  the  world,  that  we  ought  to  rejoice  that  it  is 
our  duty  to  take  the  time  to  see  it,  and  that  we  ought  not 
to  let  our  meaner  selves  obstruct  our  vision.  Those  of  us 
who  have  time  should  take  a  walk  every  day,  —  not  sim- 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.   9 1 

ply  for  the  sake  of  our  health,  but  expressly  to  see  the 
wonderful  sky  and  the  wonderful  earth.  And  who  has 
not  time  ?  There  are  unhappy  women  crowded  in  city 
garrets,  who  must  work  for  their  lives,  who  can  hardly 
lift  their  eyes  to  see  the  sunset  shining  in  at  their  attic 
windows ;  but  those  of  us  who  can  read  a  book  need  not 
plead  that  we  have  no  time  to  see  beauty. 

There  is  only  one  kind  of  reading  which  can  illuminate 
our  lives  as  Nature  can,  and  that  is  poetry.  I  have  spoken 
of  that  again  and  again.  It  seems  to  me  so  essential  to 
any  true  development  that  I  must  speak  of  it  in  many 
different  chapters.  It  is  not  enough  to  read  poetry ;  we 
must  learn  it.  If  we  are  too  dull  to  know  what  is  beau- 
tiful ourselves,  let  us  learn  some  great  poem  which  others 
have  told  us  is  beautiful,  and  in  learning  it  we  shall  think 
of  it  so  much  that  we  shall  see  the  beauty.  An  easy 
rhyme  has  a  danger,  —  we  may  catch  the  rhythm  more 
quickly  than  the  meaning.  Some  of  the  finest  poetry  is 
in  the  form  of  sonnets  ;  and  these  are  so  difficult  to  mem- 
orize that  we  are  sure  to  gain  their  secret  in  the  effort. 

To  show  you  what  I  mean,  I  am  going  to  copy  here  a 
familiar  sonnet  of  Wordsworth  which  I  do  not  think  too 
difficult  for  most  young  girls,  and  ask  if  each  of  you  who 
does  not  already  know  it  will  not  learn  it  by  heart. 

"  It  is  a  beauteous  evening,  calm  and  free ; 
The  holy  time  is  quiet  as  a  nun 
Breathless  with  adoration  ;  the  broad  sun 
Is  sinking  down  in  its  tranquillity ; 


92       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   OX   SELF-CULTURE. 

The  gentleness  of  heaven  is  on  the  sea. 

Listen  !  the  mighty  Being  is  awake, 

And  doth  with  his  eternal  motion  make 

A  sound  like  thunder  everlastingly. 

Dear  child  !    dear  girl !   that  walkest  with  me  here, 

If  thou  appear'st  untouched  by  solemn  thought, 

Thy  nature  is  not  therefore  less  divine. 

Thou  liest  in  Abraham's  bosom  all  the  year; 

And  worshipp'st  at  the  temple's  inner  shrine, 

God  being  with  thee  when  we  know  it  not." 

If  you  will  learn  tliis,  I  think  you  will  feel  as  if  you 
had  a  treasure  of  new  beauty  in  your  heart.  I  think 
you  will  be  ready  to  give  up  some  trivial  occupation  for 
a  few  minutes  every  day  to  learn  poetry  of  this  quality. 

It  is  sometimes  hard  to  find  time  for  even  noble  work 
without  neglecting  still  more  imperative  duties.  But  one 
reason  we  who  are  older  now  find  it  so  hard  to  get  time 
for  what  is  so  well  worth  doing  is  that  when  we  were 
girls  and  might  have  chosen  the  best,  we  did  not  put  the 
right  emphasis  on  our  various  employments,  and  our 
lives  became  tangled  almost  past  help.  Perhaps  some 
girl  who  sees  a  life  of  leisure  before  her  may  stop  here 
and  resolve  to  give  a  little  time  every  day  to  poetry.  If 
she  does  this,  I  should  not  be  surprised  to  find  that  ten 
years  later,  in  the  stress  of  family  cares  or  of  business 
or  of  deeds  of  mercy,  she  should  still  find  time  for  the 
daily  cnmib  of  beauty  which  will  be  essential  to  her  life. 

I  know  of  a  young  girl  growing  up  on  a  Western  ranch, 
far  away  from  people  and  from  schools.     Her  life  is  a 


CULTIVATION  OF  THE  LOVE  OF  BEAUTY.  93 

busy  one,  fall  of  the  petty  strains  which  come  from  cease- 
less household  drudgery.  Her  mother  —  a  highly  culti- 
vated lady  —  has  very  little  time  to  teach  her  children, 
the  immediate  needs  of  every  day  being  so  urgent.  Yet 
she  finds  room  for  the  best  things.  Every  evening  she 
and  her  little  daughter  sit  by  a  western  window  and  watch 
the  sun  set  while  the  mother  repeats  the  finest  poetry 
and  the  child  learns  it  from  her  lips.  In  this  way  they 
have  committed  to  memory  "Tintern  Abbey,"  and  they 
have  learned  how  Nature  can  — 

"  So  impress 
With  quietness  and  beauty,  and  so  feed 
With  lofty  thoughts  " 

that  not  even  so  dreary  and  labourious  a  life  as  theirs 
"  shall  e'er  prevail  against  "  them. 

Shakspeare  and  Milton  and  Chaucer  and  Burns  are 
thus  constantly  in  their  hearts,  and  their  life  is  far  more 
poetic  than  that  of  most  women  whose  homes  are 
crowded  with  works  of  art,  and  whose  daily  occupations 
are  in  themselves  beautiful. 

Miss  Lucy  Larcom,  whose  lovely  "  New  England  Girl- 
hood "  I  hope  every  girl  will  read,  tells  us  that  when  she 
was  working  in  a  Lowell  cotton  factory  at  thirteen  or 
fourteen  years  old,  she  obtained  permission  to  tend  some 
frames  that  stood  directly  in  front  of  the  windows  look- 
ing off  on  the  beautiful  Merrimac  River,  and  she  made 


94       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

her  window- seat  into  a  small  library  of  poetry,  pasting 
its  sides  all  over  with  newspaper  clippings.  These  she 
could  look  at  and  even  learn  by  heart  without  interrupting 
her  work. 

It  is  not  always  best  to  combine  work  and  study ;  but 
most  girls  who  have  much  manual  labour  to  do  will  find 
that  some  of  it  is  so  mechanical  that  their  minds  are  free, 
and  will  be  all  the  better  for  being  filled  with  poetry. 
When  rocking  a  cradle  or  knitting  there  is  a  mental 
breathing-space.  I  have  known  girls  who  pinned  up  a 
poem  on  the  wall  to  learn  while  washing  dishes,  and 
some  have  even  ironed  plain  clothes  in  a  satisfactory 
manner  with  a  book  open  before  them  on  the  table.  A 
poem  differs  from  other  reading  in  this.  It  is  not  only 
unnecessary  to  read  more  than  a  line  or  two  at  a  time, 
but  it  is  usually  better  to  think  over  one  line  a  few 
minutes  before  going  on  to  the  next. 

And  now,  at  last,  is  it  not  better  to  love  beauty  and 
seek  it  for  its  own  sake  than  to  wish  to  appropriate  it  to 
ourselves  as  an  accomplishment?  If  we  have  the  gifts 
and  the  opportunities  which  make  it  possible  for  us  to  be 
accomplished,  then  our  genuine  love  of  beauty  will  make 
our  accomplishments  something  more  than  a  mere  means 
of  exhibiting  ourselves,  —  they  will  be  a  blessing  to 
everybody  around  us. 


VIII. 

HOW   SHALL   WE  READ? 

A  URORA  LEIGH  says  :  — 

'*  We  get  no  good 
By  being  ungenerous,  even  to  a  book, 
And  calculating  profits,  — so  much  help 
By  so  much  reading.     It  is  rather  when 
We  gloriously  forget  ourselves,  and  plunge 
Soul-forward,  headlong,  into  a  book's  profound, 
Impassioned  for  its  beauty  and  salt  of  truth, — 
'T  is  then  we  get  the  right  good  from  a  book." 

Those  of  us  who  feel  that  reading  has  been  the  delight 
and  blessing  of  our  lives  are  ready  to  echo  this  outburst. 

I  am  a  litde  afraid,  however,  that  when  girls  are  left 
entirely  to  their  own  sweet  will  the  books  they  plunge 
gloriously  into  are  almost  all  stories.  I  like  stories  too 
well  myself  to  find  fault  with  this,  and  I  think  it  would 
be  wise  for  parents  and  guardians  to  scatter  so  many 
good  stories  in  the  pathway  of  an  ardent  girl  that  she 
would  have  no  time  left  for  trash.  Still,  as  ice-cream 
would  cloy  the  appetite  if  we  began  a  meal  with  it,  I 
believe  it  might  be  well  for  any  girl  to  spend  the  first 
part  of  her  leisure  every  day  in  reading  for  study  rather 


96       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

than  merely  for  recreation,  —  that  is,  unless  she  has  already 
done  her  full  share  of  study  in  school.  And  if  she  is  a 
bright  girl  and  has  any  access  to  really  worthy  books,  she 
will  be  sure  to  find  herself  plunging  gloriously  in  before 
she  has  gone  far. 

An  old  lady  tells  me  that  when  she  was  a  young  girl 
teaching  her  first  school  she  was  very  indignant  with  one 
of  the  committee,  who  criticised  her  reading-class  on  the 
ground  that  no  child  should  ever  read  a  single  word  of 
which  he  could  not  give  the  definition.  "Then  they 
never  would  read  anything,"  she  replied,  with  spirit.  I 
hope  I  shall  not  be  thought  superficial  if  I  say  my  sym- 
pathies are  all  with  her.  To  be  always  breaking  the 
thread  of  one's  thought  to  look  up  a  word  in  the  diction- 
ary or  to  trace  out  a  classical  allusion  seems  to  me  enough 
to  check  any  ordinary  enthusiasm.  As  for  words,  by 
the  time  we  have  read  the  same  word  a  dozen  times  in 
different  connections  we  know  its  meaning  flir  better  than 
if  we  had  halted  painfully  at  its  first  appearance  and 
looked  for  it  in  the  dictionary. 

One  of  the  largest-minded  men  I  ever  knew  once 
remarked  in  my  hearing  that  he  had  advised  his  wife's 
little  fifteen -year-old  English  maid-servant  to  read 
Herbert  Spencer's  "  Education."  "  Do  you  think  she 
can  understand  it  ?  "  I  asked.  "  Not  all  of  it,"  he  replied. 
"  That  is  the  reason  I  gave  it  to  her.  She  is  a  clever 
gid,  and  ought    to    make    something  of   herself.      It    is 


HOW   SHALL  WE   READ?  97 

wholesome  for  her  to  find  there  are  things  beyond  her 
comprehension." 

I  would  not  discourage  any  girl  from  looking  up  all 
the  new  words  and  all  the  classical  allusions  which 
she  feels  an  earnest  wish  to  understand;  but  I  believe 
the  best  way  to  read  is  to  take  a  paragraph,  a  chap- 
ter, and  sometimes  even  a  book  as  a  whole  first,  and 
then  return  to  it  again  and  again  till  we  have  made  it 
thoroughly  our  own.  I  suppose  we  look  up  definitions 
that  we  may  better  understand  the  author's  meaning, 
so  we  do  not  vvish  to  lose  the  drift  of  his  argument  in 
the  attempt. 

I  once  knew  a  conscientious  young  lady  who  under- 
took some  difficult  scientific  reading.  An  elder  friend 
had  pursued  the  same  course  a  year  or  two  previously, 
and  the  two  seldom  met  even  in  the  street  that  the 
younger  did  not  inquire  into  the  meaning  of  some  knotty 
paragraph  which  was  barring  her  way.  "  Read  on,  and 
then  come  back  to  it,"  was  always  the  laughing  reply. 
At  last,  one  day  the  younger  said,  "  I  verily  believe  you 
are  right.  When  I  can't  understand  a  sentence,  the  next 
sentence  usually  explains  it." 

Who  ever  did  understand  anything  beyond  the  primer 
at  first  reading  ?  It  is  superficial  to  think  you  do ;  but 
if  you  have  not  the  courage  and  perseverance  to  reread 
the  first  chapters  of  any  book  that  is  worth  while  in  the 
light  of  the  last  chapters,  then  perhaps  you  are  super- 

7 


98       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

ficial.  In  books  and  a  few  other  things,  the  whole  is 
greater  than  the  sum  of  all  its  parts. 

It  is  generally  a  good  plan  in  studying  a  lesson  to  read 
it  all  first  before  beginning  to  learn  it.  The  Harvard 
examination  papers  give  the  direction,  "  Read  over  a 
passage  several  times  before  attempting  to  write  your 
translation."     This  saves  time  in  the  end. 

Even  a  novel  that  treats  life  and  character  with  any 
wisdom  deserves  rereading.  If  you  lay  it  aside  ten 
years  and  then  come  back  to  it,  you  find  far  more  in  it 
than  at  first,  for  your  own  experience  and  growth  have 
opened  your  eyes ;  but  even  if  you  reread  it  at  once, 
the  development  of  character  at  the  close  teaches  some- 
thing new  of  the  meaning  of  the  first  scenes. 

All  this  is  still  truer  of  solid  books.  I  have  heard 
thoughtful  people  say,  for  instance,  that  Emerson  has  no 
dialectic.  (Do  not  look  up  the  meaning  of  "  dialectic  " 
just  yet.)  They  say  that  every  sentence  is  a  gem,  full  of 
beauty  and  truth  and  power ;  that  one  of  his  essays  is  a 
collection  of  such  jewels  ;  but  that  there  is  no  dominating 
thought  in  each  to  which  every  sentence  contributes. 
This  is  not  true ;  but  it  is  not  at  the  first  reading  that  we 
find  out  it  is  not  true.  There  is  dialectic  in  every  essay ; 
but  the  closely  packed  jewels  are  so  brilliant  that  each 
one  absorbs  our  whole  attention  for  the  time,  and  we  are 
too  exhausted  at  the  end  of  the  chapter  to  recall  so 
many  thoughts  and   understand   their   bearing  on  each 


HOW   SHALL  WE   READ?  99 

Other.  But  we  take  up  the  same  essay  the  next  day  and 
the  next,  and  at  last  we  see  the  whole  design.  Even  a 
young  girl  would  find  it  well  worth  her  while  to  do  this 
with  an  essay  or  two,  though  I  know  I  must  not  expect 
many  girls  to  care  deeply  for  Emerson  till  they  are  far 
beyond  their  teens,  and  I  shall  have  no  quarrel  with  them 
because  their  Scott  and  Dickens  are  so  much  dearer  to 
them,  for  I  love  Scott  and  Dickens  myself.  And  yet 
some  of  you  find  even  Scott  dull ! 

Here  let  me  say  that  it  is  never  best  to  give  up  altogether 
reading  an  author  we  know  to  be  great  even  if  we  can- 
not understand  him.  Keep  on  reading  a  little  at  a  time, 
at  short  intervals,  and  the  light  is  sure  to  dawn  gradually. 
Especially  if  a  book  contains  an  argument,  we  must  try 
to  look  at  it  as  a  whole,  before  we  can  fully  master 
details ;  but  we  need  not  do  it  all  at  once.  Never  work 
over  any  subject  after  your  brain  begins  to  be  tired. 
Turn  to  something  else  till  to-morrow,  and  then  the 
crooked  places  will  be  made  straight. 

A  great  work  usually  has  some  message  for  all  of  us.  I 
know  a  child  of  five  years  who  already  begins  to  love 
Shakspeare.  Her  mother  has  taken  pains  to  read  to  her 
some  of  the  fairy  parts  of  the  "  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream,"  arranging  them  in  a  connected  story.  When 
the  child  seems  restless,  the  mother  skips  the  long  pas- 
sages, and  confines  her  reading  simply  to  the  story,  but 
now  she  puts  in  a  speech  of  Titania  and  again  one  of 


lOO       CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

Oberon,  and  explains  as  much  of  it  as  the  child  seems  to 
enjoy.  The  mother  does  not  read  the  "  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream  "  every  day  or  every  week  to  the  child  ; 
but  after  a  little  inter\^al,  she  asks,  "  Shall  we  have  Titania 
again?"  and  the  child  thinks  it  is  a  treat.  Moreover, 
the  little  one  already  goes  about  the  house  singing  or 
reciting,  "  I  know  a  bank  whereon  the  wild  thyme  blows," 
or  "How  now,  spirit,  whither  wander  you?"  Suppose 
the  mother  had  waited  till  the  child  could  understand 
every  word  of  the  play  before  beginning  to  read  it,  do 
you  think  the  child  would  ever  have  found  the  same 
charm  in  Puck  and  Bottom  and  Peasblossom  and  Mustard 
Seed? 

I  know  a  young  girl  who  has  an  absorbing  musical 
genius.  She  also  has  a  rare  power  of  appreciating  fine 
poetry ;  but  oddly  enough,  the  other  members  of  her  fam- 
ily care  only  for  music,  so  that  she  has  been  left  to  grow 
up  without  any  training  in  literature ;  and  not  having 
formed  the  habit  of  reading  she  now  reads  very  little  and 
very  slowly,  her  time  and  thoughts  being  given  almost 
exclusively  to  her  musical  education.  Yet  I  know  no 
other  girl  who  reads  so  satisfactorily.  When  she  was 
about  eighteen,  she  discovered  that  Shakspeare  was  meant 
for  her.  This  is  the  way  she  makes  acquaintance  with  a 
play.  First  she  reads  it  through  just  as  she  has  time  and 
inclination,  thinking  over  any  passage  that  interests  or 
puzzles  her,  and  marking  the  lines  that  are  so  grand  or 


HOW   SHALL  WE   READ?  lOI 

beautiful  that  she  feels  as  if  she  must  learn  them.  Then 
she  looks  up  the  history  which  may  happen  to  be  con- 
nected with  the  play.  Occasionally  she  reads  a  criticism. 
Next  she  learns  the  lines  she  has  marked.  Afterwards 
she  reads  the  whole  play  again.  If  she  has  a  chance  to 
see  it  on  the  stage,  she  reads  it  once  more  before  going 
to  the  theatre,  and  still  again  after  she  has  seen  it.  It 
usually  takes  her  six  or  eight  weeks  to  read  a  play,  and 
she  enjoys  every  moment  of  her  reading.  **  If  I  am 
blue,"  she  says,  "I  take  up  my  Shakspeare,  and  forget 
my  troubles." 

I  know  another  girl,  who  has  lived  among  literary  peo- 
ple all  her  life,  who  will  read  a  sublime  passage  of 
Shakspeare  aloud  smoothly,  and  almost  with  feeling ;  and 
yet  if  you  ask  her  at  the  end  of  it  to  tell  you  its  sub- 
stance, her  ideas  abont  it  prove  to  be  hazy.  Rapid 
readers  are  in  danger  of  falling  into  this  careless  habit. 
If  you  are  conscious  of  having  such  a  habit,  stop  at  the 
end  of  every  paragraph  and  see  if  you  know  exactly 
what  you  have  been  reading  about.  Indeed  you  are  one  of 
the  girls  who  probably  need  to  look  up  every  definition  as 
they  go  along,  for  every  check  to  the  mere  flow  of  words 
will  help  you  to  think,  true  as  it  is  that  whenever  atten- 
tion to  mere  words  checks  the  flow  of  thought  there  is 
some  danger  of  losing  the  best  of  the  reading.  Under 
some  circumstances  it  is  really  worth  while  to  look  up 
your  classical   and   Scriptural  allusions,  though   I  have 


'»02      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

always  firmly  believed  that  the  way  to  understand  them 
was  to  read  the  classics  and  the  Scriptures  instead  of 
using  Lempriere's  Dictionary  or  Cniden's  Concordance. 
Of  course  we  all  wish  to  be  accurate  ;  and  though  we 
must  not  sacrifice  the  whole  of  a  subject  to  its  de- 
tails, we  must  go  in  search  of  a  great  many  irksome 
particulars. 

It  is  often  thought  that  accurate  knowledge  depends 
on  one's  intellectual  and  moral  firmness,  and  certainly 
it  does  have  to  do  with  character.  Nevertheless  it  is 
frequently  a  matter  of  access  to  books.  We  do  not  all 
have  the  "  Encyclopaedia  Britannica  "  at  our  elbow,  even 
when  we  are  quite  willing  to  take  the  trouble  to  look 
up  a  doubtful  question.  We  do  all  need  a  well-equipped 
private  library  if  our  reading  is  to  go  very  deep.  Pub- 
lic libraries  are  a  great  blessing,  but  I  am  afraid  they 
tempt  us  to  spend  some  of  the  money  in  bonbons  which 
we  ought  rightfully  to  spend  in  books.  Free  school 
text-books  have  the  same  tendency.  They  were  intro- 
duced in  Massachusetts  with  the  best  intentions,  but  I 
have  always  felt  that  they  defrauded  all  but  the  very 
IX)or  of  their  right  to  own  their  school-books.  A  young 
lady  forgets  a  date  in  histor)-.  She  knows  exactly  where 
to  find  it  in  the  text-book  she  used  in  school,  and  if 
she  owns  the  book  she  refers  to  it  and  remembers  the 
date  ever  after.  But  if  she  must  spend  an  hour  in  a 
public   library  looking  up  the  matter,  the    chances   are 


HOW  SHALL  WE   READ?  103 

she  never  does  it,  and  is  always  at  a  loss.  Of  course 
we  are  still  free  to  buy  our  text- books,  but  when  our 
purse  is  light  the  temptation  is  strong  to  make  use  of 
those  provided. 

Most  of  us  cannot  buy  many  books,  but  it  is  worth 
while  to  buy  as  many  as  we  can.  We  all  want  an  un- 
abridged dictionary  and  an  encyclopaedia  and  a  few 
books  of  reference ;  still,  if  we  must  choose,  do  we  not 
need  Shakspeare  even  more  than  a  dictionary,  and  do 
not  most  of  us  get  more  help  in  noble  living  from  the 
pages  of  George  Eliot  than  from  an  encyclopaedia? 

Whenever  you  buy  a  book,  buy  one  that  means  some- 
thing to  you,  even  if  it  is  a  novel  or  a  child's  story. 

For  what  is  the  object  of  reading? 

Is  it  not  that  we  may  enter  into  the  best  thoughts  of 
the  men  and  women  of  all  time  and  be  helped  by  them 
to  our  own  best  and  fullest  life?  Now  all  writers  do 
not  help  all  readers.  Of  course  a  book  must  be  genu- 
ine to  help  anybody ;  but  the  child  or  the  undeveloped 
man  or  woman  may  sometimes  be  best  reached  by 
simple  books  which  are  too  elementary  to  be  even 
glanced  at  by  those  who  have  reached  a  higher  stage  of 
culture.  I  myself  was  brought  up  on  the  Rollo  books 
and  Miss  Edgeworth's  stories,  and  retain  a  fondness 
for  them  to  this  day.  But  I  had  a  schoolmate  —  a 
girl  of  genius  —  who  laughed  to  scorn  the  idea  that  any 
child   could  be   interested   in   such  every-day  philoso- 


104      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

phy  as  these  works  contain.  She  said  that  she  would 
rather  by  half  have  read  Jonathan  Edwards  '*  On  the 
Affections  "  when  she  was  a  child,  and  I  remember  feel- 
ing quite  ashamed  of  my  commonplace  tastes.  Now, 
however,  I  am  very  glad  that  since  I  was  not  a  genius, 
my  parents  provided  Abbot  and  Miss  Edgeworth  for 
me  instead  of  Edwards. 

Though  none  of  us  can  afford  to  be  careless  in  any 
of  our  reading,  it  has  always  seemed  to  me  right  that 
there  should  be  a  great  difference  between  reading  for 
study  and  for  recreation.  Some  teachers  say  that  if  a 
girl  wishes  to  read  a  novel  when  she  is  studying  the 
reign  of  Elizabeth,  it  will  be  as  much  recreation  for  her 
to  read  "  Kcnil worth  "  as  any  other  novel.  But  that 
depends  upon  whether  she  chooses  the  book  herself. 
Recreation  impHcs  freedom.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  read 
"  Kenilworth  "  when  studying  the  reign  of  Elizabeth. 
Most  of  us  get  our  first  vivid  ideas  of  English  history 
from  Scott  and  Shakspeare.  But  if  a  tired  girl  thought 
a  novel  would  rest  her,  and  saw  both  **  Kenilworth  " 
and  "John  Halifax"  lying  on  the  table,  and  knew  that 
of  the  two  she  must  take  "  Kenilworth,"  even  if  she 
liked  it  as  well  as  "John  Halifax"  she  would  have  a 
feeling  of  restraint  sure  to  tell  on  her  nen'es  at  last ; 
and  she  would  not  only  get  no  relaxation  from  her 
reading,  but  it  is  doubtful  whether  she  would  learn  as 
much   by   dwelling    on  one    subject   all   the   time.     By 


HOW   SHALL  WE   READ?  105 

looking  long  at  a  colour  the  eye  becomes  fatigued,  and 
it  is  refreshing  to  see  another.  I  once  visited  an  asylum 
for  the  feeble-minded  where  the  children  were  taught 
to  read  by  means  of  words  printed  in  large  letters  on 
strips  of  pasteboard.  A  teacher  who  was  trying  to  in- 
struct a  beginner  held  in  her  hand  two  strips,  one  with 
the  word  "  eye  "  upon  it,  and  the  other  with  the  word 
"  blackboard."  "  Why  do  you  use  such  different  words  ?  " 
I  asked.  *•'  Because  it  is  so  much  easier  for  a  child  to 
distinguish  words  which  do  not  look  alike,"  she  replied. 
Even  if  from  the  educational  point  of  view  it  were 
best  to  pursue  one  subject  to  the  bitter  end,  there  would 
be  no  recreation  in  such  reading.  Play  ought  to  be 
play,  and  should  not  be  haunted  by  a  sense  of  duty.  But 
as  rough  or  cruel  play  can  never  be  allowed,  so  silly 
and  bad  books  cannot  be  tolerated.  Wise  parents  put 
so  many  good  books  in  the  way  of  their  children  that 
the  taste  for  them  is  formed  unconsciously,  and  there 
is  never  any  feeling  of  restraint.  But  some  girls  must 
form  their  own  taste,  and  if  they  are  in  earnest,  it  will 
not  take  them  very  long  to  banish  all  wish  for  worth- 
less literature,  though  perhaps  for  a  few  months  recrea- 
tion will  not  be  entirely  recreation. 


IX. 

WHAT   SHALL  WE   READ? 

T  WONDER  if  any  girls  may  wish  that  I  would  give 
them  a  few  suggestions  as  to  the  books  they  should 
read.  I  cannot  lay  down  a  course  of  reading  because 
that  should  vary  with  the  needs  of  each  girl.  Still,  in 
almost  every  chapter  of  this  volume  I  have  had  occasion 
to  refer  to  some  book  or  other  which  might  give  help  in 
some  direction ;  and  by  the  time  you  have  read  these 
books,  you  will  perhaps  be  able  to  judge  for  yourself 
what  you  most  require.  What  I  have  to  say  here  is 
more  general. 

First,  let  us  talk  a  little  about  novels.  It  is  not  alto- 
gether because  girls  are  superficial  that  they  crave  so 
much  of  such  food  ;  but  partly  because  they  rightly  have 
a  greater  interest  in  life  than  in  knowledge,  and  partly 
because  a  story  makes  so  many  obscure  things  clear. 
Some  people  must  have  everything  in  the  form  of  a  story 
if  they  are  to  understand  it  at  all. 

Yet  many  of  the  greatest  novels  are  ill-adapted  to 
girls.     In  the  first  place,  girls  ought  to  know  the  good  in 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  READ?  lO/ 

the  world  before  they  learn  much  of  its  evil,  and  in 
the  second  place  they  cannot  really  appreciate  a  novel 
which  deals  with  the  passions  and  temptations  of  older 
people  till  they  have  had  some  experience  themselves. 
Any  great  novel  requires  and  deserves  study.  Those 
who  read  it  in  girlhood  must  read  it  later  in  life  also. 
Unless  they  do  this,  it  is  a  greater  loss  in  the  develop- 
ment of  mind  and  character  to  read  a  great  novel  pre- 
maturely than  to  try  to  master  a  work  on  science  or 
language  for  which  they  are  unprepared. 

Then,  moreover,  the  coarseness  girls  are  so  carefully 
guarded  from  in  books  and  in  society  does  not  really 
hurt  them  as  much  as  worldliness.  Girlhood  is  not  the 
time  for  any  novelist  who  does  not  believe  that  some- 
thing besides  the  actual  is  possible  and  necessary.  What- 
ever Dickens's  faults  may  be,  he  can  be  trusted  here, 
and  I  never  knew  a  girl  who  loved  Dickens  who  was  not 
large-hearted.  If  a  girl  appreciates  Thackeray,  "The 
Newcomes  "  is  a  better  book  for  her  to  read  than  "  Vanity 
Fair."  Scott  is  one  of  the  masters  always  to  be  trusted 
to  present  a  natural  world  which  is  nevertheless  rosy 
with  the  light  of  romance. 

There  are  half  a  dozen  fresh,  sweet  story-writers  girls 
are  always  the  better  for  reading,  —  Mrs.  Mulock-Craik, 
Mrs.  Whitney,  Miss  Thackeray,  Miss  Yonge,  Miss  Alcott, 
Black.  Many  a  girl  in  a  rough  and  poor  home  learns 
how  to  be  a  gentlewoman  from  constant  association  with 


I08      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

their  gentle  heroines.  Girls  in  every  grade  of  society 
except  the  highest  get  as  many  of  their  ideas  of  manners 
from  novels  as  from  people.  Every  girl  may  have  noble 
society  in  books.  Faith  Gartney,  and  Leslie  Goldthwaite, 
and  the  March  girls  in  **  Little  Women,"  and  "  D  dear  " 
in  "Off  the  Skelligs,"  and  all  Miss  Mulock's  dear  girls, 
and  Florence  Dombey,  and  the  Agnes  of  "  David  Cop- 
perfield,"  and  Lily  Dale  and  her  sister  Bell  in  TroUope's 
'*  Small  House  at  Allington "  (though  Trollope  has  a 
worldly  touch,  and  I  do  not  wonder  that  his  fine  humour 
seldom  appeals  to  a  girl),  and  Ethel  Newcome,  and 
Jeanie  Deans,  and  Maggie  with  her  cousin,  little  Lucy,  in 
the  "  Mill  on  the  Floss,"  and  the  Dorothea  of  "  Middle- 
march  "  are  always  ready  to  be  her  friends. 

A  girl  ought  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  George 
Eliot's  fine  heroines  while  she  is  still  a  girl,  but  she  must 
not  think  she  can  read  George  Eliot's  novels  once  for 
all  while  she  is  in  her  teens.  They  must  be  studied  for 
new  meanings  at  ever}'  stage  of  life,  just  as  Shakspeare's 
plays  must  be. 

School-girls  do  not  have  much  time  for  solid  reading 
beyond  that  prescribed  by  their  teachers,  and  the  thou- 
sands of  girls  who  must  earn  their  living  as  soon  as  they 
leave  school  have  still  less  time  ;  but  I  hope  that  all  who 
can  spare  an  hour  a  day  for  reading  will  spend  part  of  it 
on  solid  books.     If  we  have  a  great  deal  of  leisure,  most 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  READ?  109 

of  our  reading  should  take  the  form  of  study.  We  may 
for  instance  make  ourselves  at  home  in  epoch  after 
epoch  of  history,  or  we  may  study  one  science  after  an- 
other in  something  better  than  the  school-girl  fashion. 
With  less  leisure,  we  may  still  read  to  some  purpose  by 
spending  a  good  many  months  on  one  subject.  I  once 
heard  a  lady  say,  *'  My  daughter  and  I  have  spent  the 
whole  winter  in  Greece."  She  meant  that  they  had 
read  Greek  history  and  Greek  poetry  and  Greek  phi- 
losophy, and  had  looked  at  reproductions  of  Greek  art, 
though  they  had  hardly  been  away  from  their  own 
chimney-corner. 

Now  there  are  thousands  of  books  worth  reading,  and 
nobody  can  read  them  all.  There  have  been  many  ad- 
mirable essays  written  on  the  choice  of  books.  Emer- 
son's essay  on  "  Books  "  in  the  volume  "  Society  and 
Solitude  "  gives  a  splendid  list  of  the  great  books  of  the 
world.  Many  of  these  works  are  far  beyond  the  powers 
of  young  girls.  I  will  not  try  to  add  to  such  a  catalogue ; 
but  there  are  a  {qw  suggestions  I  wish  earnestly  to  make. 
One  is  that  each  reader  should  be  guided  by  her  natural 
powers  in  choosing  what  to  read.  I  do  not  mean  that 
we  should  read  carelessly  whatever  strikes  our  fancy  at 
the  moment ;  but  as  all  of  us  who  are  honest  with  our- 
selves know  what  are  our  best  gifts  and  our  worst 
faults,  that  we  should  choose  the  subjects  and  the  books 
which  will  develop  our  powers  and  correct  our  faults. 


no     CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

For  instance,  if  we  love  the  Greeks  and  hate  the  Romans, 
while  we  are  indifferent  to  the  Egyptians,  let  us  by  all 
means  make  a  thorough  study  of  the  Greeks,  so  that  our 
zeal  may  be  according  to  knowledge ;  but  let  us  make  a 
thorough  study  of  the  Romans  too,  so  that  we  may  know 
whether  our  ill-will  is  due  to  their  character  or  our  own. 
Perhaps  the  study  will  show  us  some  personal  weaknesses 
which  especially  need  treatment.  We  can  put  off  read- 
ing about  the  Egyptians  to  a  later  date.  Or,  if  we  love 
philosophy  and  hate  science,  or  vice  versGy  the  same 
rule  holds. 

But  whatever  our  tastes  or  talents,  there  are  two  kinds 
of  reading  essential  for  all,  fur  men  as  well  as  women, 
for  old  as  well  as  young.  Of  course  you  know  that  one 
of  these  is  poetry.  Sooner  or  later  we  must  all  know 
Shakspeare  and  Milton,  Dante  and  Homer,  and  parts  of 
Goethe  by  heart.  These  great  poets  rank  with  the  Bible 
and  with  the  bibles  of  other  races  in  their  influence  upon 
us.  And  we  cannot  spare  the  lesser  poets  either.  Girls 
especially,  to  whom  the  *'  Divine  Comedy  "  or  "  Faust" 
sometimes  seem  so  remote  as  to  be  sealed  books,  can  find 
the  most  wholesome  nutriment  in  Chaucer  and  Cowper 
and  Bums,  in  Whittier  and  Longfellow  and  Lowell,  in 
Mrs.  Browning  and  Keats  and  Tennyson.  Most  of  us 
have  to  wait  till  past  girlhood,  I  am  afraid,  to  understand 
Wordsworth ;  and  Browning,  though  he  is  worth  the 
effort,  taxes  the  greatest  of  our  mature  powers. 


WHAT   SHALL   WE   READ?  Ill 

Poetry  cannot  be  translated,  and  yet  the  women  who 
do  not  read  Greek  cannot  afford  to  miss  what  even  a 
translation  can  give  of  ^schylus  and  Sophocles  and 
Euripides.  The  characters  in  their  dramas  and  the 
high  thought  and  action  cannot  be  disguised  even  in  the 
prose  of  another  language. 

But  after  all,  in  poetry  itself  what  we  read  is  not  the 
important  thing.  We  should  read  poetry  to  give  us  a 
certain  attitude  of  mind,  a  habit  of  thinking  of  noble 
things,  of  keeping  our  spirit  in  harmony  with  beauty  and 
goodness  and  strength  and  love,  that  — 

"All 
The  dreary  intercourse  of  daily  life 
Shall  [not]  prevail  against  us." 

*'  Poetry  is  the  fact,"  says  Matthew  Arnold,  in  his  won- 
derful essay  at  the  beginning  of  Ward's  ''  English  Poets." 

The  other  kind  of  reading  which  is  essential  is  the 
news  !  This  is  not  because  we  need  to  know  the  daily 
gossip  of  the  whole  world  to  save  ourselves  from  daily 
mortification  on  account  of  our  ignorance,  but  for  a  very 
different  reason.  The  great  object  of  our  reading  is  to 
keep  our  mind  in  a  certain  state.  Now,  if  we  should 
read  nothing  but  great  poetry,  we  should  lose  touch  with 
common,  every-day  Hfe  about  us,  and  with  all  our  fine 
thoughts,  we  might  grow  weak  and  selfish.  We  want  to 
know  how  the  whole  world  is  living  and  acting.  If  we 
are  to  help  to  make  it  better,  we  must  know  its  sorrows,  its 


112      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

faults,  even  its  crimes.  How  could  we  help  anybody  if  we 
only  gathered  up  our  own  robes  out  of  the  mire  our  fellow- 
creatures  have  fallen  into?  That  kind  of  virtue  is  so 
weak  that  it  is  almost  sure  to  give  way  in  the  moment  of 
pressure.  Of  course  I  do  not  mean  that  we  want  to 
spend  much  time  every  day  over  a  newspaper.  A  news- 
paper almost  always  dissipates  the  mind.  That  is  the 
reason  I  cannot  look  with  favour  on  Sunday  papers.  We 
ought  to  save  Sunday  for  the  higher  Ufe. 

"  Sundays  the  pillars  are, 
On  which  heav'n's  palace  arched  lies." 

"The  week  were  dark,  but  for  thy  light; 
Thy  torch  doth  show  the  way." 

There  is  a  passage  in  Bryce's  *'  American  Common- 
wealth "  in  which  he  speaks  of  the  attitude  of  mind  pro- 
duced by  reading  newspapers.  He  says  that  even  if  a 
newspaper  contains  a  great  essay  or  poem,  scarcely  any 
reader  gets  the  full  value  of  the  fine  thought  because  his 
mind  is  not  adjusted  to  receive  it.  He  is  hurrying 
through  the  paper  as  fast  as  he  can  with  the  purpose  of 
getting  at  facts,  not  thoughts.  This  would  be  a  sufficient 
reason  for  not  spending  much  time  over  newspapers, 
even  if  there  were  no  other ;  and  I  should  be  very  sorry 
if  American  women  should  ever  form  the  habit,  which  is 
becoming  so  pernicious  among  American  men,  of  depend- 
ing on  newspapers  for  their  chief  mental  food.  There 
is  not  very  much  danger  of  this  at  present.     Girls  at 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  READ?  1 13 

least,  not  caring  much  for  business  or  politics,  find  news- 
papers very  dull.  There  is  more  danger  that  they  will 
spend  so  much  time  over  the  lighter  magazines,  where 
information  and  thought  are  served  up  piecemeal,  that 
they  will  have  no  time  or  strength  for  reading  of  value. 
Nevertheless,  a  girl  who  wishes  to  develop  into  a  well- 
balanced  woman  must  supplement  her  reading  of  great 
poetry  with  a  little  reading  of  a  dry  newspaper.  I  think 
a  weekly  paper  much  better  for  a  girl  just  beginning  to 
read  newspapers  than  a  daily.  She  will  then  get  the 
important  news  without  wasting  her  time  over  trash; 
and  when  at  last  her  interests  become  so  wide  that  she 
needs  a  daily  paper,  she  will  know  how  to  discriminate 
between  what  she  wants  to  read  and  what  she  wants  to 
skip. 


X. 

TRAVEL. 

TRAVELLING  is  delightful.  Even  when  it  is 
fatiguing,  it  is,  as  somebody  says,  "  delightful  to 
have  travelled."  And  as  a  means  of  gaining  information 
it  is  unsurpassed.  Dr.  Edward  Everett  Hale  tells  us  that 
this  is  the  way  to  "realize  our  geography."  It  is  the 
way  to  realize  other  things,  too.  Not  long  ago,  a  young 
girl  told  me  she  had  heard  a  sermon  in  which  the  clergy- 
man declared  that  he  should  like  to  look  back  at  the  end 
of  his  life,  and  feel  that  every  year  he  had  seen  something 
more  of  God's  beautiful  world  ;  and  that  accordingly  her 
father  had  decided  to  take  the  whole  family  for  a  trip 
across  the  continent,  to  visit  the  Rocky  Mountains,  the 
Yosemite  Valley,  and  the  Yellowstone  Park.  Beauty  is  all 
around  us  to  be  sure,  but  the  new  vision  does  often  mean 
more  to  us  than  the  old  one.  After  all,  the  real  value  of 
travelling  depends  on  the  fact  that  we  change  our  point  of 
view.  A  fine  woman,  who  went  from  the  East  to  make  her 
home  in  St.  Louis  some  thirty  years  ago,  when  communica- 
tion between  different  parts  of  the  country  was  not  so  com- 


TRAVEL.  1 1  5 

plete  as  now,  said,  "  I  felt  that  this  change  of  home  tested 
me  in  every  point.  All  my  habits  of  life  were  changed, 
and  all  the  people  I  saw  had  different  standards  from  those 
at  the  East.  I  have  had  to  decide  what  was  essential  and 
what  merely  superficial  in  both  manners  and  creed." 

But  we  must  have  a  definite  point  of  view  before  it 
will  be  of  any  use  to  go  in  search  of  a  new  standpoint. 
We  need  to  learn  a  great  deal  about  the  place  where  we 
are  born  before  it  will  be  much  more  than  dissipation  to 
travel.  It  always  seems  to  me  something  of  a  misfor- 
tune for  a  little  child  to  be  dragged  over  Europe,  though 
it  is  true  enough  that  such  a  child  does  learn  far  more  of 
places  and  people  than  he  could  at  home ;  and  if  the 
end  of  education  is  to  speak  French  and  German  fluently, 
it  is  necessary  that  the  child  should  spend  much  time  in 
France  and  Germany  when  very  young. 

Travel  is  a  great  quickener  in  education,  but  it  is  not 
the  foundation  of  it.  What  does  the  Tower  of  London 
mean  to  one  who  knows  nothing  of  English  history,  or 
Loch  Katrine  to  one  who  reads  the  "  Lady  of  the  Lake  " 
for  the  first  time  in  connection  with  the  guide-book  ? 

I  am  glad  to  notice  that  so  many  fathers  and  mothers 
with  abundant  means  now  seem  to  realize  the  importance 
of  having  their  children  thoroughly  trained  at  school  and 
in  college  before  sending  them  abroad  even  to  study. 
Then  they  are  all  ready  to  see  and  understand  with 
enthusiasm. 


Il6      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

The  mood  in  which  one  takes  a  journey  is  of  impor- 
tance. It  is  not  often  in  a  large  party  that  all  are  in  the 
right  mood.  One  is  ill,  and  thinks  only  of  her  digestion. 
Another  has  been  hurried  abroad  to  break  off  an  unfor- 
tunate love  affair,  etc.  I  know  a  delightful  young 
girl  who  is  putting  off  a  European  trip  for  almost  a  year, 
because  she  says  solemnly  that  nothing  shall  be  allowed 
to  interfere  with  class- day  at  Harvard  next  June  !  Never- 
theless, whatever  the  mood,  new  sights  and  sounds  do 
take  us  so  effectually  out  of  ourselves,  that  even  the  dys- 
peptics and  the  unhappy  usually  come  back  from  an 
extended  tour  with  invigorated  bodies  and  minds. 

If  we  had  all  the  leisure  and  money  we  wanted,  it 
certainly  would  not  be  best  to  travel  all  the  time.  So 
many  different  standpoints  would  only  reduce  our  mental 
condition  to  that  of  a  kaleidoscope.  The  ideal  plan 
would,  I  think,  be  an  outing  of  perhaps  one  month  in 
every  twelve,  and  a  long  European  or  South  American  or 
Asiatic  tour  about  one  year  in  five.  Europe  ought  to  be 
seen,  at  least  for  the  first  time,  within  a  few  years  after 
leaving  school,  in  order  that  the  stimulus  it  gives  us  in 
the  study  of  art  and  history  and  literature  should  be 
received  early  enough  to  be  a  distinct  influence  in  the 
choice  of  our  studies  of  a  life-time. 

So  few  of  us  have  either  the  leisure  or  the  money  to  do 
as  we  please,  however,  that  perhaps  it  is  hardly  best  to  con- 
sider any  ideal  which  depends  on  these  alone.     We  must 


TRAVEL. 


117 


take  our  journeys  whenever  we  can,  and  few  of  us  suffer 
from  a  surfeit  of  travelling.  Sometimes  it  is  even  neces- 
sary that  travel  should  be  the  chief  means  of  education. 
I  know  a  family  of  girls  who  travelled  from  the  time 
they  were  eight  or  ten  years  old  till  they  were  past  the 
school  age,  first  in  America,  then  in  Europe  and  the 
East.  Their  father's  business  was  such  that  there  was  no 
alternative.  But  the  father  and  mother  were  educated 
people  who  knew  what  to  see;  and  they  had  definite 
principles  which  made  it  possible  to  give  their  daughters 
fixed  habits  in  spite  of  their  constantly  changing  sur- 
roundings. So  the  girls  are  well-educated.  They  studied 
Roman  history  in  Rome,  and  Greek  history  in  Greece, 
and  art  in  the  galleries  of  Florence  and  Dresden  and 
Paris.  They  read  Coleridge  and  Shelley  in  the  Vale  of 
Chamounix,  and  Bums  at  the  Bridge  of  Doon,  and  Shaks- 
peare  everywhere.  They  acquired  the  modern  languages 
almost  without  knowing  it.  In  climbing  the  great  pyra- 
mid, they  learned  more  of  Egypt  than  most  of  us  ever 
know.  They  reread  their  Bible  carefully  in  the  East. 
Without  the  strong  hand  of  the  father  and  mother  these 
girls  would  probably  have  received  merely  a  succession 
of  pleasant  impressions ;  but  their  parents  taught  them 
how  to  compare  one  country  or  people  or  language  with 
another,  and  they  were  saved  from  superficiality. 

Though  most  of  us  would  not  be  the  better  for  such 
continual  travel,   we   all   need   to  change  the  point  of 


Il8      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

view  from  time  to  time  ;  and  few  of  us  are  so  unfortunate 
that  we  cannot  sometimes  do  so,  if  we  realize  that  it  is 
important.  A  lady  once  said  to  me,  "  When  I  found 
that  my  home  in  the  country  must  be  broken  up  and  that 
I  must  come  to  the  city  and  earn  my  living,  I  could  not 
bear  to  think  of  the  change.  But  now  I  rejoice  in  it.  I 
was  as  narrow  as  a  crack  before  I  came,  for  everything 
went  on  always  in  the  same  placid  routine." 

I  had  a  friend  to  whose  lot  it  fell  to  teach  fourteen  or 
fifteen  years  in  one  school.  She  did  not  however  grow 
narrow  or  opinionated.  *'  I  get  my  variety,"  she  used  to 
say,  with  a  smile,  "  in  changing  boarding-places  !  "  She 
was  not  a  fussy  boarder ;  but  some  cause  or  other  usually 
made  it  necessary  to  change  once  in  two  or  three  years, 
and  she  was  rather  glad  of  it,  because  this  gave  her  a 
new  aspect  of  life.  Some  people  would  have  lamented 
their  hard  fate  without  trying  to  see  what  they  could  get 
from  their  experience. 

"  To  make  daily  a  new  estimate,  that  is  greatness," 
says  Emerson.  If  we  are  wise,  a  fresh  set  of  circum- 
stances will  help  us  to  make  a  new  estimate.  This  is 
what  travel  does  for  us  if  we  do  not  travel  too  frequently. 

I  have  always  liked  the  German  plan  for  girls.  A 
country  girl,  at  sixteen  or  seventeen,  is  sent  to  live  in  the 
family  of  some  friend  in  the  city,  and  a  city  girl  is  sent 
in  the  same  way  into  the  country.  These  girls  are  to  be 
taught  housekeeping.   They  pay  no  board  and  receive  no 


TRAVEL.  1 19 

wages,  but  do  what  they  are  told.  They  are  treated  as 
daughters  of  the  family,  and  they  learn  not  only  house- 
keeping but  new  modes  of  life. 

And  now  a  few  words  as  to  how  we  shall  travel.  What 
do  we  want  to  see  in  foreign  lands  ?  I  knew  a  young 
lady  who  on  her  return  from  Europe  could  tell  you  what 
she  had  had  to  eat  in  every  hotel.  She  is  not  necessarily 
to  be  condemned.  If  Mrs.  Lincoln  or  Miss  Corson 
travel  I  have  no  doubt  they  can  also  tell  what  they 
have  to  eat;  and  they  will  know  it  so  accurately  that 
they  will  be  able  to  show  weary  housekeepers  all  over 
the  world  how  to  vary  their  monotonous  bill-of-fare  by 
new  and  dainty  dishes.  But  at  the  same  time  Mrs.  Lin- 
coln at  least,  and  Miss  Corson  I  dare  say,  will  be  able  to 
tell  you  about  the  English  Cathedrals,  or  the  palace  of 
Versailles.  At  all  events,  these  ladies  will  pay  attention 
to  their  bill-of-fare  for  a  purpose,  and  not  because  their 
whole  mind  is  set  on  what  they  have  to  eat. 

Of  course  we  cannot  all  see  exactly  the  same  sights. 
Each  of  us  is  educated  to  the  point  of  seeing  some 
things,  but  not  all  things.  Let  us,  however,  be  sure  to 
look  for  the  best  we  can  see.  One  of  my  friends  quotes 
a  friend  of  hers  as  saying  that  Europe  seemed  to  him  a 
network  of  railways,  leading  from  one  great  picture- 
gallery  to  another.  Only  a  cultivated  person  could  think 
of  Europe  in  that  way.  But  I  know  a  highly  cultivated 
lady,  and   one   who   loves  art,  too,  who  says   that   the 


120      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

absorbing  interest  which  Europe  or  any  other  country 
has  for  her  is  in  the  people  she  sees.  She  loves  the 
whole  human  family,  and  likes  to  observe  how  the  en- 
vironment modifies  the  essential  characteristics  of  each 
member  of  it. 

At  least  let  us  not  spend  our  time  when  travelling  in 
looking  at  things  we  can  see  equally  well  at  home.  I  saw 
an  English  girl  who  was  making  her  first  trip  up  the  Rhine 
reading  a  novel  all  the  way  in  spite  of  the  anxiety  of  her 
papa,  who  tried  to  call  her  attention  to  one  point  of 
beauty  after  another.  The  novel  may  have  been  a  good 
one,  but  that  was  not  the  place  to  read  it. 

I  once  had  only  a  few  hours  for  a  drive  from  Melrose 
to  Abbotsford.  Knowing  that  every  inch  of  the  ground 
must  be  rich  in  associations  with  Scott's  novels  and 
poetry,  I  asked  the  driver  to  point  out  ever}'thing  of 
interest  as  we  drove  along.  He  was  a  good-natured 
fellow  and  showed  the  greatest  wish  to  please  me.  Every 
minute  or  two  he  turned  round  with  some  remark  for  my 
instruction.  "This,"  he  would  say,  impressively,  "is 
the  new  National  Schoolhouse  ;  "  "  this  is  the  Dissenting 
Chapel,"  and  so  on  and  so  on. 

If  we  do  not  know  what  we  want  to  see  before  we  set 
out  on  our  travels,  we  shall  miss  much  of  the  best  which 
lies  in  our  pathway.  If  our  previous  education  has  not 
been  broad  we  cannot  see  all  we  would  ;  but  I  think 
there  are  two  things  always  to  be  looked  for,  and  that  if 


TRAVEL.  121 

we  look  for  these,  our  travelling  will  not  be  in  vain.  One 
is  beauty,  —  either  of  nature  or  of  art ;  especially  of  art, 
perhaps,  because  nature  is  as  beautiful  at  home  as  abroad. 
The  other  is  the  present  and  past  life  of  other  nations, 
for  this  teaches  us  our  own  relation  to  other  people,  and 
shows  us  what  is  essential  in  our  own  ideals.  For  either 
of  these  two  objects  a  trip  to  Europe  is  better  than  a 
journey  to  San  Francisco.  We  sometimes  hear  people 
say  with  a  meritorious  air  that  they  should  not  be  willing 
to  go  to  Europe  till  they  had  seen  their  own  country 
thoroughly.  This  has  a  conscientious  sound,  but  is  based 
I  think  on  a  misconception  of  the  purpose  of  travel.  It 
is  true  we  must  learn  to  know  our  own  home  before  going 
away  from  it,  for  there  our  duties  begin.  Our  home 
gives  us  the  type  of  life  with  which  all  other  types  are  to 
be  compared.  But  when  we  go  away  from  home,  we 
want  most  to  see  the  highest  civilization  and  the  most 
perfect  art,  so  that  England  and  Italy  are  a  better  stimu- 
lus for  us  than  California  and  Alaska.  I  am  glad  that 
some  of  my  friends  can  see  Sitka  as  well  as  Rome ;  but 
those  of  us  whose  leisure  and  money  are  limited  enrich 
our  lives  more  by  visiting  Rome  than  Sitka,  and  as  to 
expense,  I  believe  it  really  costs  less. 

One  word  may  not  be  out  of  place  in  reference  to  the 
temper  we  carry  with  us  on  our  journeyings.  A  friend 
who  travelled  through  the  East  with  a  large  party  told 
me  that  sometimes  the  fatigue  of  riding  on  horseback  or 


122      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

on  a  camel  was  so  great  that  she  thought  she  could  not 
possibly  keep  up  with  the  rest ;  but  that  she  nerved  her- 
self to  go  on,  for  she  always  wondered  whether,  in  case 
she  should  fall  by  the  wayside,  any  one  of  that  eager 
company  could  spare  time  to  stop  and  help   her. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  remember  an  incident  which 
came  to  my  notice  in  Rome.  Two  sisters  had  arranged 
to  go  to  St.  Peter's  for  a  special  Easter  service.  They  had 
always  longed  to  hear  that  one  service  in  that  one  spot, 
and  now  the  opportunity  of  their  lifetime  had  come. 
A  lady  staying  at  the  same  hotel,  hearing  them  make 
their  plan,  asked  to  join  them,  fancying  she  too  would 
like  to  hear  the  music,  though  it  was  not  a  matter  of 
enough  interest  to  her  to  have  led  her  to  make  an  inde- 
pendent plan.  She  was,  moreover,  rather  out  of  health, 
so  that  she  was  very  likely  to  break  down  in  the  midst 
of  any  excursion.  For  these  reasons,  the  sisters  were 
sorry  she  had  proposed  going  with  them,  though  they 
were  too  kind  to  refuse  her  request.  She  delayed  them 
by  her  elaborate  preparations,  and  I  thought  the  elder 
sister  quite  justified  in  saying  decisively  to  her  that  they 
would  not  wait  five  minutes  longer.  As  it  was  they  did 
not  reach  the  church  till  just  as  the  service  was  begin- 
ning, and  at  that  moment,  the  self-innted  guest  was 
taken  ill.  The  younger  sister  turned  pale  with  disap- 
pointment when  it  proved  that  the  guest  could  neither 
go  on  nor  be  left  alone.     **  You  must  stay,"  said  the 


TRAVEL.  123 

elder  sister,  without  an  instant's  hesitation.  "  She  does 
not  need  us  both,  I  will  go  back  to  the  hotel  with  her." 
"  But  you  will  miss  the  service,"  pleaded  the  younger 
sister,  with  tears  in  her  eyes.  "  Yes,"  said  the  elder,  se- 
renely ;  "  but  after  all,  what  are  we  in  the  world  for  but 
to  make  the  best  of  it  for  everybody?  "  So  she  missed 
the  fulfilment  of  the  dream  of  a  lifetime,  but  she  did  not 
miss  something  far  better.  You  see  she  did  not  weakly 
indulge  the  guest  when  the  latter's  carelessness  seemed 
likely  to  destroy  the  arrangement  for  the  morning ;  but 
when  her  own  cherished  plan  was  interrupted  by  the 
misfortune  of  another  she  did  not  waste  a  moment  in 
unavailing  regret,  but  promptly  gave  up  her  own  wishes ; 
and  I  am  not  aware  that  she  ever  referred  to  the  matter 
again  with  any  irritation. 

Some  of  us  must  stay  at  home.  We  never  have  time 
or  money  or  opportunity  to  travel.  How  can  we  get  the 
best  of  travel  without  the  fact  ? 

By  enlarging  our  mental  horizon.  The  study  of  bot- 
any or  of  entomology,  or  still  more  of  field  geology,  will 
often  change  the  face  of  a  familiar  landscape  so  much 
that  we  shall  not  need  to  travel  a  thousand  miles  to  see 
a  new  earth.  Miss  Jewett  in  a  wholesome  little  book  for 
girls  called  "  Betty  Leicester  "  tells  us  how  a  thorough 
study  of  the  history  of  the  town  we  live  in  will  give  us 
the  key  to  the  history  of  the  whole  country.     If  we  do 


124      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

not  see  new  nations,  we  can  at  least  try  to  understand 
the  people  in  our  own  village ;  and  when  we  do  this  sym- 
pathetically, we  may  leam  as  much  from  the  Irish  or 
German  or  French  families  in  our  neighborhood  as  if 
we  lived  a  few  weeks  in  a  hotel  in  Dublin  or  Berlin  or 
Paris.  And  if  our  eyes  are  open  to  beauty,  there  is  no 
waste  place  so  desolate  that  we  may  not  see  the  glor)^  of 
a  fresh  sunrise  and  a  fresh  sunset  every  day. 


XL 

THE  CULTIVATION  OF  A  SENSE  OF  HUMOUR. 

'*  1\  TY   dear,"  said  a  gentleman  to  his  wife,  runs  an 

^^■*'  old  anecdote,  "you  would  n't  see  a  joke  if  it 
were  fired  at  you  out  of  an  ii-inch  Dahlgren."  "  Oh, 
my  dear,"  responded  the  wife,  "  you  know  they  don't 
fire  jokes  out  of  guns  !  " 

It  does  really  seem  like  a  piece  of  presumption  to 
suppose  that  one  may  cultivate  a  sense  of  humour.  We 
all  know  that  a  sense  of  humour  is  absolutely  indispensa- 
ble to  lubricate  the  wheels  of  life,  and  we  feel  that  it  is 
a  special  blessing  of  Heaven  to  be  endowed  with  it ;  but 
who  can  dare  to  think  of  cultivating  it  ? 

Perhaps  if,  as  Emerson  suggests,  we  could  be  generous 
with  our  dignity  as  well  as  with  our  money,  we  might 
find  our  perception  of  humour  increasing.  If  we  were 
willing  to  laugh  at  a  joke  against  ourselves,  should  we 
not  establish  humour  on  a  partially  ethical  basis  ?  And 
everybody  knows  that  ethics  can  be  cultivated. 

Nothing  so  often  saves  us  from  being  ridiculous  as  a 
sense  of  humour ;  and  on  the  other  hand,  nothing  com- 
forts us  so  much  when  we  are  ridiculous. 


126      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

Brothers  are  of  inestimable  value  in  cultivating  a  girl's 
sense  of  humour.  They  see  all  her  little  foibles,  and  have 
no  false  sensitiveness  about  presenting  them  in  the  most 
picturesque  and  striking  fashion  for  her  contemplation. 
Most  girls  cry  freely  under  this  discipline,  but  that  is  not 
the  way  to  cultivate  a  sense  of  humour.  We  ought  to  be 
grateful  to  our  brothers  for  making  us  so  ridiculous  in 
private  that  we  know  better  than  to  indulge  in  our  sen- 
timental airs  and  graces  in  public,  which  would  make  us 
ridiculous  before  a  hard-hearted  audience.  We  ought 
to  encourage  our  brothers  and  laugh  with  them,  espe- 
cially when  the  laugh  is  against  ourselves.  The  fact  is, 
we  always  laugh  kindly  at  ourselves.  Now,  if  our  per- 
ception of  humour  grows  in  this  fashion,  it  is  sure  to  re- 
main kindly  when  we  trust  ourselves  to  laugh  at  other 
people,  for  we  know  exactly  how  they  feel,  and  make 
the  same  excuses  for  their  absurdities  which  we  have  had 
so  much  practice  in  making  for  our  own. 

I  fancy  reading  the  genuine  humourists,  like  Lamb 
and  Dickens,  will  keep  us  more  alive  to  the  sweetly 
amusing  side  of  things. 

But  on  the  whole  I  thiuK  our  best  personal  contribu- 
tion to  our  education  in  humour  is  in  making  a  distinct 
effort  to  see  the  funny  side  of  the  petty  annoyances  which 
cause  half  the  trouble  of  life.  Such  elTorts  will  never  be 
thrown  away  even  if  we  do  not  succeed  in  finding  out 
whether  jokes  are   fired   from  guns  or  not,  because  we 


CULTIVATION  OF  A  SENSE  OF  HUMOUR.        12/ 

shall  be  so  much  better  women  in  consequence.  I  re- 
member the  heroine  of  a  novel,  who  when  there  was 
nothing  but  bread  for  dinner  cut  it  up  in  half  a  dozen 
different  ways  and  pretended  to  serve  it  in  courses,  — 
soup,  fish,  roast,  and  so  on.  No  doubt  the  bread  actu- 
ally digested  better  for  the  playful  subterfuge. 

"All  my  silver  was  stolen  last  week,"  said  a  lady, 
gayly ;  "  but  it  is  great  fun  to  use  pewter.  You  can  al- 
ways pretend  that  the  reason  the  dinner  is  poor  is  be- 
cause it  tastes  of  the  pewter,  and  not  because  it  is  burnt 
or  underdone  or  heavy." 

It  is  a  saving  grace  to  be  able  and  willing  to  make 
small  jokes.  "  I  love  and  admire  Miss  Seaver,"  said  a 
young  lady,  ''but  I  am  afraid  of  her;  I  should  never 
dare  to  make  a  poor  joke  before  her." 

I  have  often  thought  we  were  all  too  much  afraid  of 
laughing  at  poor  jokes.  It  is  true  we  do  not  wish  to 
laugh  at  coarse  ones.  But  we  are  too  severe  on  weak 
ones.  Let  us  honour  the  good  intention  and  the  gentle 
hope  of  pleasing  which  leads  to  their  manufacture,  and 
pay  them  the  tribute  of  a  smile. 

"  I  have  often  respected  you,"  said  one  lady  to  an- 
other who  sat  at  the  same  boarding-house  table,  "  when 
I  have  observed  the  persistent  good  nature  with  which 
you  smile  at  every  inane  joke  of  those  silly  college  boys." 

"  Oh,  well,  you  know  the  boys  are  trying  to  be  agree- 
able," was  the  reply.    "  I  can't  bear  to  hurt  their  feelings." 


128      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

No  one  can  be  witty  who  is  not  bom  to  be ;  but  I  am 
half  inclined  to  believe  that  the  sense  of  humour  belongs 
to  character,  and  may  be  cultivated.  It  requires  quick 
observation,  but  it  also  requires  gentleness  and  kindli- 
ness and  wholesomeness.  Now,  to  be  wholesomely 
alive  to  the  amusing  side  of  our  daily  irritations,  we  must 
be  well.  When  we  are  ill  or  tired  or  worn,  every  annoy- 
ance annoys  too  much.  We  cannot  look  beneath  it  for 
a  joke,  —  though  I  do  remember  several  delightful  inva- 
lids who  made  their  sick-rooms  sweet  with  laughter ;  but 
they  had  a  genius  for  humour,  and  were  exceptions  which 
prove  the  rule.  Therefore  as  a  final  suggestion  for  the 
cultivation  of  a  sense  of  humour  I  present  this,  — 

Do  your  best  to  be  perfectly  well  at  all  times  both  in 
body  and  mind. 


XII. 

DULL  GIRLS. 

THERE  is  not  so  much  difference  as  many  people 
think  between  bright  girls  and  dull  ones. 

As  there  are  all  grades  of  dulness  I  hope  that  girls 
who  are  sure  they  are  bright  will  not  skip  this  chapter, 
especially  as  some  of  my  remarks  will  apply  to  those 
who  are  limited  in  time  or  money  as  well  as  in  intellect. 
Whether  we  are  dull  or  bright,  we  wish  to  make  of  our- 
selves all  that  can  be  made  of  the  stuff. 

It  is  not  best  to  malign  the  stuff  given  us  to  work  up 
into  a  worthy  fabric.  Do  not  allow  yourselves  to  think 
you  are  duller  than  you  are.  If  you  cannot  do  one 
thing,  you  can  do  another.  I  knew  a  girl  who  could  not 
learn  arithmetic,  but  she  led  her  class  in  botany.  I 
remember  a  boy  who  could  not  pass  the  college  examina- 
tions in  Latin,  who  yet  became  a  distinguished  physician. 
So,  if  you  think  you  are  dull,  take  special  pains  to  find 
out  what  your  gift  is,  and  cultivate  that.  Some  of  you 
have  beauty  or  grace  or  good-temper.  Suppose  you 
make  the  most  of  these  things.     Even  beauty  can  be 

9 


130      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

used  for  something  better  than  the  gratification  of  vanity. 
For  instance,  a  beautiful  woman  can  often  make  a  needed 
reform  in  dress  attractive  when  a  plain  one  would  per- 
haps make  it  absurd.  Some  of  you,  however,  may  be 
l^lain  and  awkward  as  weii  as  dull.  Perhaps  you  may 
still  have  money  or  other  opportunities  which  render 
your  part  in  the  world  as  important  as  that  of  those  who 
have  greater  personal  gifts.  The  first  law  for  every  dull 
girl,  and  indeed  for  all  of  us,  is  this  :  — 

Do  not  spend  your  time  in  mourning  for  the  gifts 
which  were  not  given  to  you,  but  in  learning  how  to  use 
those  you  have  received. 

No  doubt,  however,  any  dull  girl  who  takes  the  trouble 
to  read  a  volume  on  self-culture  has  already  the  first 
essential  of  culture,  —  teachableness. 

I  remember  an  amiable  girl  at  school  who  worked  over 
her  books  from  morning  till  night,  but  who  could  never 
learn  her  lessons.  I  heard  one  of  her  most  patient  and 
sympathetic  teachers  say  of  her,  "  I  should  not  like  to 
try  so  hard  for  nothing."  Now  if  we  hope  for  any  result 
from  our  hard  work,  we  must  attempt  to  understand 
what  we  can  do. 

How  are  you  dull  ?  Have  you  a  poor  memory,  or  are 
you  wanting  in  the  power  of  reasoning  about  things  which 
do  not  interest  you? 

It  is  pleasant  and  convenient  to  have  a  good  memory, 
but  we  need  not  be  ashamed  if  it  was  not  given  to  us. 


DULL  GIRLS.  I3I 

I  hope  you  all  remember  that  Columbus  discovered 
America  —  though  that  has  been  disputed  —  and  that 
Milton  wrote  "  Paradise  Lost."  But  if  in  spite  of  faith- 
ful study  you  cannot  remember  these  things,  you  may  be 
sure  they  are  of  no  importance  to  you,  however  valuable 
to  others.  Some  persons  have  the  power  of  always 
making  any  fact  they  do  not  know  seem  not  worth  the 
knowing.  "  I  take  a  certain  pride,"  I  once  heard  a  young 
girl  say,  "  in  not  having  read  all  the  new  books."  I  sup- 
pose she  meant  that  she  had  more  important  things  to 
do.  Though  she  was  not  a  learned  young  lady,  she  had 
a  fine,  forcible  character,  unfailing  amiability,  and  a 
delightful  sense  of  humour.  All  her  time  was  well  spent, 
and  all  her  conversation  was  entertaining.  Why  then 
should  she  think  it  was  necessary  to  read  all  the  new 
books  ?  Wisdom  is  always  better  than  learning.  Still,  if 
a  studious  girl  grows  up  without  being  able  to  remember 
who  wrote  "  Paradise  Lost ''  —  which  we  will  let  stand 
for  all  the  every-day  facts  most  people  blush  to  be  igno- 
rant of — it  is  certain  that  something  is  wrong  in  her 
education.  Probably  she  has  tried  to  learn  who  wrote 
too  many  books.  A  dull  girl  must  not  waste  her  energies 
on  too  many  subjects. 

There  are  certain  things  everybody  is  expected  to 
know,  and  though  it  is  not  necessary  you  should  know 
them  all  —  and  indeed  most  bright  women  do  not  know 
them  all  —  yet  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to  spend  your 


132      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

strength  over  these  rather  than  over  other  things.  I  am 
tempted  to  make  out  a  Httle  course  of  study  for  girls 
who  know  they  are  dull,  and  perhaps  it  will  do  for  those 
who  are  hampered  in  other  ways. 

I.  You  want  to  read  easily  and  intelligently ;  and  — 

II.  To  write  plainly  and  neatly. 

III.  I  have  a  word  to  say  about  spelling.  I  once 
knew  an  idiot  girl  who  could  spell  such  words  as  Cincin- 
nati and  Himalaya  backwards  as  well  as  fonvards.  On 
the  other  hand,  one  of  the  most  cultivated  women  I  have 
ever  seen  tells  me  that  when  she  was  a  girl  her  father 
made  her  a  present  of  two  dictionaries,  one  to  be  kept 
upstairs  and  the  other  downstairs.  "  For,  my  dear,"  he 
said,  "  I  do  not  wish  to  see  so  much  bad  spelling  in  your 
letters,  and  now  you  will  have  no  excuse  for  not  looking 
up  every  word  you  are  in  doubt  about."  In  the  polite 
world,  an  ill-spelled  letter  does  carry  disgrace  with  it ; 
but  if  you  are  not  a  natural  speller,  I  think  it  might  be 
as  well  to  buy  the  dictionaries. 

IV.  Mathematics.  Every  girl  needs  a  thorough  knowl- 
edge of  mental  arithmetic,  as  set  forth  in  such  a  little 
book  as  that  of  Warren  Colburn,  —  the  power  to  add, 
subtract,  multiply,  and  divide  large  numbers  easily,  and  to 
be  accurate  in  keeping  accounts.  Most  school-girls  study 
mathematics  for  eight  or  nine  years,  and  there  are  few 
who  could  not  master  the  subjects  I  have  mentioned  if 
they  would  give  all  the  time  they  have  to  spend  on  mathe- 


DULL  GIRLS.  133 

matics  to  this  rudimentary  work.  Most  girls  could  do 
more ;  and  I,  at  least,  rejoice  whenever  one  can  go  on  to 
higher  and  higher  branches  till,  like  Philippa  Fawcett, 
she  carries  all  the  prizes  away  from  the  University  stu- 
dents. The  important  point,  however,  is  to  do  the 
essential  work  first,  and  then  we  need  not  be  troubled  if 
there  is  no  time  left  for  anything  more. 

V.  Languages.  The  very  dullest  girls  have  a  right 
to  give  all  their  energies  to  learning  to  speak  and  write 
English  clearly  and  correctly.  It  is  also  worth  while  to 
try  to  use  the  exact  word  to  express  the  thought.  The 
grade  just  above  this  may  study  one  other  language. 
French  will  probably  be  most  available,  as  it  is  not  hard 
to  translate.  A  dull  girl  who  has  special  advantages  may 
perhaps  learn  still  other  languages,  but  it  is  not  generally 
best. 

It  is  the  privilege  of  dull  girls  and  busy  girls  and  deli- 
cate girls  to  read  translations  without  compunction. 
They  are  not  obliged  to  feel  that  they  might  do  some- 
thing better.  Of  course  they  can  never  appreciate  the 
Iliad  as  well  as  if  they  understood  Greek,  but  they 
can  get  a  great  deal  that  is  of  value  from  a  translation. 
Dorothea,  in  '^  Middlemarch,"  is  grieved  because  learned 
men  get  "  so  worn  out  on  the  way  to  great  thoughts  that 
they  have  no  power  left  to  enjoy  them."  A  dull  girl  has 
a  right  to  begin  with  great  thoughts. 

VI.     Science.     A  dull  girl  need  not  try  to  learn  much 


134      CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

of  more  than  one  science.  She  may  choose  the  one  she 
likes  best  and  begin  with  the  simplest  book.  For  in- 
stance if  she  studies  botany,  Gray's  little  volume  "  How 
Plants  Grow  "  will  give  her  a  delightful  introduction  to 
the  subject  without  obliging  her  to  learn  many  hard 
words.  Now,  a  clever  girl  must  analyze  her  flowers  by 
the  most  complete  manual  she  can  buy,  but  a  dull  girl 
has  a  perfect  right  to  the  easiest 

VII.  History.  Every  girl  who  lives  in  the  United 
States  must  know  something  of  its  history.  A  dull  girl 
need  not  be  ambitious  to  read  through  extensive  trea- 
tises. Suppose  she  takes  a  very  little  book  and  an  en- 
tertaining one,  —  such  an  one  as  that  by  T.  W.  Higginson, 
for  instance,  —  and  learns  it  thoroughly.  If  she  cannot  do 
that  in  one  year,  perhaps  she  can  in  two  years ;  or  if  not 
in  two,  then  in  three.  By  that  time  she  will  have  a 
foundation  for  reading  United  States  history,  and  I  should 
not  be  surprised  if  all  through  her  life  she  should  read 
entertaining  books  of  history  with  real  zest.  I  do  not  say 
that  even  then  her  education  in  history  will  not  be  super- 
ficial, and  yet  I  think  it  quite  probable  that  it  will  go  as 
deep  as  that  of  the  majority  of  her  bright  acquaintances. 

Some  simple  history  of  England,  Greece,  Rome, 
France,  and  Germany  must  follow.  But  a  dull  girl  can 
allow  herself  three  or  four  years  for  each  country.  It  is 
not  necessary  that  she  should  get  her  whole  education  in 
school.     Dickens's  **  Child's  Histor>'  of  England  "  is  a 


DULL  GIRLS.  1 35 

good  illustration  of  the  kind  of  book  I  mean.  That 
gives  the  currently  received  facts  of  English  history  in  a 
very  agreeable  form.  No  doubt  an  accurate  scholar 
finds  many  mistakes  in  it ;  but  it  certainly  will  do  more 
than  many  a  greater  work  to  give  a  dull  girl  a  prelimi- 
nary knowledge  of  England. 

A  dull  gill  must  have  entertaining  books  to  read.  By 
virtue  of  her  dulness  she  is  allowed  to  study  only  the 
most  interesting  things  in  the  most  interesting  way.  A 
dull  mind  cannot  digest  a  dull  book,  no  matter  how  ad- 
mirable it  is.  So,  in  spite  of  the  inaccuracies  which  are 
charged  to  the  series  of  fascinating  little  biographies  by 
the  Abbotts,  I  think  they  are  still  well  worth  reading  by 
any  dull  girl  (as  well  as  by  a  good  many  people  who  are 
not  dull)  who  wants  to  have  a  general  knowledge  of  his- 
tory. Miss  Strickland's  "  Queens  of  England  "  is  another 
book  which  will  hold  the  attention  like  a  novel. 

In  these  days  of  historical  research,  however,  more 
recent  books  are  likely  to  be  more  correct.  And  some 
late  biographies  are  entertaining.  Perhaps,  for  instance, 
some  of  those  included  by  Macmillan  &  Co.  in  their 
"  English  Men  of  Action  "  series,  by  Dodd,  Mead,  &  Co. 
in  their  "  Makers  of  America  "  series,  and  by  Houghton, 
Mifflin,  &  Co.  in  their  "  American  Statesmen  "  series  may 
not  be  beyond  the  powers  of  dull  girls.  Very  likely, 
however,  a  dull  girl  can  learn  history  better  from  stories. 
Many  a  girl  knows  the  facts  of  the  Reformation  from  Mrs. 


136      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

Charles's    charming    "  Schonberg-Cotta    Family,"    who 
would  otherwise  be  quite  ignorant  of  that  epoch. 

Of  course  a  bright  girl  must  have  accurate  knowledge, 
but  a  dull  girl  has  not  always  the  choice.  She  can  only 
assimilate  the  kind  of  knowledge  that  belongs  to  her. 

VIII.  Geography.  Other  countries  and  people  form 
so  important  a  subject  of  conversation  in  every  civilized 
community  that  a  girl  ignorant  of  geography  is  oftener 
put  to  shame  than  if  she  were  deficient  in  science  or 
arithmetic.  Moreover  there  are  so  many  delightful  vol- 
umes of  travel  that  nothing  is  easier  than  to  learn  some- 
thing of  geography  by  reading  them,  especially  if  one  has 
the  perseverance  to  look  out  the  places  mentioned  on  a 
map.  This  seems  to  me  a  peculiarly  suitable  kind  of  read- 
ing for  dull  girls.  Though  they  are  to  be  excused  from 
reading  dull  books,  they  want  to  read  useful  books ;  and 
though  it  is  not  their  duty  to  study  works  beyond  their 
capacity,  that  does  not  mean  that  they  are  to  be  excused 
from  painstaking  work  within  their  power,  such  as  the 
drudgery  of  looking  out  places  on  a  map. 

IX.  Literature.  The  dullest  girl  can  afford  to  nt-glcct 
language,  science,  history,  and  even  mental  arithmetic 
better  than  she  can  afford  to  neglect  literature.  Every 
one  ought  to  read  a  few  of  the  best  books.  Every  one 
who  speaks  the  Eni^/ish  hjfiguage  vinst  knim>  something 
of  Shakspeare.  I  have  often  seen  dull  girls  glow  with 
enthusiasm  over  the  "Merchant  of  Venice,"  which  is  one 


DULL  GIRLS.  1 37 

of  the  best  plays  to  begin  with.  A  girl  who  has  read  a 
dozen  plays  thoroughly  has  a  very  good  literary  founda- 
tion. These  should  not  be  first  read  —  at  all  events  by 
a  stupid  girl  •—  in  the  order  of  their  greatness,  and  yet 
her  strength  should  be  given  as  far  as  possible  to  the 
greater  plays.  I  will  here  suggest  a  good  order  for 
reading  a  dozen  of  the  best  ones  :  — 

I.  The  Merchant  of  Venice.  2.  Julius  Caesar.  3. 
Macbeth.  4.  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream.  5.  Henry 
VIII.  6.  King  Lear.  7.  The  Tempest.  8.  King  John. 
9.  Romeo  and  Juliet.  10.  As  You  Like  It.  11. 
Hamlet.     12.  Othello. 

You  can  well  afford  to  be  half  a  dozen  years  in  read- 
ing these  few  plays.  Only  when  you  do  read  them,  be 
sure  to  give  your  freshest  and  best  attention  to  them. 
When  you  are  familiar  with  them  all,  you  will  probably 
want  to  add  to  the  list  Henry  IV.  and  Henry  V.,  Winter's 
Tale,  Cymbeline,  and  Richard  III. ;  and  very  likely  you 
will  go  on  adding  to  the  list  all  your  life.  But  remem- 
ber that  it  is  not  essential  that  you  should  read  all 
Shakspeare's  plays,  and  that  you  should  never  expect 
to  exhaust  all  the  meaning  of  a  single  one.  The  im- 
portant point  is  that  you  should  have  the  elevation  of 
mind  which  comes  from  association  with  such  a  poet  as 
Shakspeare. 

Other  poets  you  may  read  as  you  have  time  and  in- 
chnation ;  but  I  hope  Milton  will  be  one  of  them.     At 


138      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

all  events,  let  a  large  part  of  the  energy  you  give  to  real 
study  be  given  to  the  best  poetry. 

Much  of  your  other  reading  will  inevitably  be  novels. 
If  you  are  very  dull,  even  novels  that  are  valuable  may  be 
hard  reading.  Scott  is  considered  solid  food  by  some 
girls.  If  that  is  the  case  with  you,  do  not  be  ashamed 
to  confess  it.  If  Scott  requires  study,  he  is  also  worth 
study,  and  so  are  all  the  great  novelists.  For  recrea- 
tion, you  can  always  read  some  of  the  simple  and  sweet 
story-tellers.  You  need  not  even  despise  children's 
books.  Many  of  us  middle-aged  people  of  average 
brightness  find  pleasure  and  rest  and  even  instruction  in 
good  children's  books.  You  cannot  afford  to  spend  any 
time  over  poor  books  ;  but  if  you  steadily  read  good  and 
interesting  novels  as  well  as  good  and  interesting  chil- 
dren's books,  you  will  both  enjoy  your  reading,  and 
you  will  in  the  end  have  a  kind  of  education  which 
though  not  great  will  rest  on  solid  foundations,  —  for  every 
good  novel  and  every  worthy  book  for  children  depends 
for  its  vail  j  on  the  understanding  the  writer  has  of  life 
and  character,  while  an  entertaining  book  is  usually  full 
of  allusions  to  current  events  and  manners  which  it  is 
useful  and  agreeable  for  any  girl  to  know  about. 

X.  Music,  Drawing,  and  Other  Arts.  Arts  like  danc- 
ing, horseback-riding,  etc.,  require  chiefly  bodily  training, 
and  need  not  be  considered  here,  though  they  are  of 
great  value,  and  luckily  many  a  girl  who   is  dull  at  her 


DULL  GIRLS.  1 39 

books  excels  without  difficulty  in  these  beautiful  accom- 
plishments. And  often  such  a  girl  has  some  real  artistic 
gift.  When  she  is  so  happy,  she  has  a  right  to  devote 
herself  to  that.  But  no  one  art  is  essential,  and  if  a  girl 
has  no  gift  she  has  no  corresponding  duty.  It  is  so 
important,  however,  that  every  one  should  have  some 
artistic  training,  that  even  a  dull  girl  must  not  be 
an  exception.  She  should  try  to  cultivate  any  artistic 
taste  of  which  she  has  even  a  germ.  She  may  not 
have  a  good  voice,  but  perhaps  she  can  learn  to  sing 
hymns.  She  may  never  be  able  to  draw  a  tree,  but 
in  trying  to  learn  she  may  become  able  to  appreciate 
Corot's  trees. 

Indeed  I  think  the  attempt  to  make  the  most  of  the 
smallest  artistic  gift  is  more  necessary  for  dull  girls  than 
bright  ones ;  for  it  is  a  theory  of  mine  —  borne  out  I 
believe  by  facts  —  that  the  mission  of  dull  girls  who  have 
no  special  mission  in  the  world  is  to  fill  all  the  waste 
places  with  beauty.  A  girl  who  cannot  master  botany, 
for  instance,  has  all  the  more  time  to  arrange  flowers  and 
cultivate  a  beautiful  garden.  How  many  dull  women 
make  exquisite  homes  because  they  can  give  their  whole 
heart  to  that  work  !  They  know  they  can  never  do  any- 
thing great,  and  so  they  lavish  care  and  thought  on  their 
own  little  corner.  If  they  are  so  unfortunate  as  to  feel 
that  their  little  corner  is  the  whole  world,  their  devotion 
to  small  things  belittles  them ;  but  if  they  simply  look  at 


140      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

it  as  the  centre  of  the  work  they  can  do,  it  will  become  a 
haven  of  beauty  and  repose  for  all  who  pass  by. 

I  am  not  an  advocate  of  fancy-work.  A  life  given  to 
it  is  usually  very  poor.  Yet  fancy-work  has  its  place.  I 
know  a  young  lady  whose  delicate  health  has  prevented 
her  from  studying  as  her  brothers  and  sisters  have  done. 
The  only  work  she  could  do  has  been  to  beautify  her 
own  comer  of  the  world.  This  she  has  done.  She  has  her- 
self a  fragile  loveliness  which  is  heightened  by  the  dainty 
though  simple  dresses  which  she  has  time  to  plan.  She  is 
like  a  beautiful  old  painting  as  she  sits  by  the  window  with 
her  soft  wools  and  rich  embroidery  silks.  She  does  not 
multiply  tidies  in  a  room  till  they  bewilder  the  visitor,  but 
the  necessary  table-covers  and  piano-covers  and  napkins 
and  footstools  have  all  intrinsic  beauty  from  the  patient, 
affectionate  work  of  her  skilful  fingers.  If  her  heart  were 
all  given  to  her  fancy-work  she  would  be  sure  to  overload 
her  rooms  ;  but  though  she  scarcely  moves  from  her  cen- 
tre, she  has  an  outlook  on  the  world.  She  does  a  part  of 
the  daily  household  work.  All  the  beautiful  cooking  for 
the  family  is  hers.  She  puts  the  finishing  touches  to  the 
attractive  table.  There  is  large  hospitality  in  the  family, 
and  she  is  always  sweet  and  fresh  and  ready  to  entertain 
visitors.  She  takes  them  into  the  garden  and  gathers 
flowers  for  them,  or  makes  tea  for  them  in  the  summer- 
house.  She  is  not  a  student,  but  she  reads  the  best 
novels.    She  is  not  a  remarkable  musician ;  but  she  prac- 


DULL   GIRLS.  I4I 

tises  some  good  music  every  day,  and  is  always  ready  to 
play  an  acceptable  second  in  a  duet  or  an  accompani- 
ment to  a  song.  Best  of  all,  she  has  the  unfailing  sweet- 
ness of  temper  which  smoothes  the  way  of  the  whole 
household.  I  did  not  say  that  she  was  a  dull  girl,  but 
she  might  be  dull  and  still  do  all  these  good  deeds. 

A  dull  woman,  working  in  her  own  corner,  who  pauses 
every  day  to  get  the  *Mift  "  given  her  by  Shakspeare,  who 
goes  out  of  her  corner  every  day  to  be  refreshed  by  the 
splendour  of  nature,  and  to  enter  into  the  life  and 
thought  of  people  beyond  her  own  family  circle,  and 
who  welcomes  her  friends  hospitably  to  the  one  little 
nook  it  is  her  province  to  make  lovely,  cannot  be  petty 
though  she  works  with  small  tools. 

Some  one  is  sure  to  say  that  the  minimum  of  education 
which  I  have  set  down  for  the  dullest  women  does  after 
all  involve  more  than  many  a  bright  woman  ever  attains. 
It  is  so.  Many  a  bright  woman  who  reads  incessantly 
does  not  read  Shakspeare,  and  girls  who  are  struggling 
with  algebra  often  fail  hopelessly  in  keeping  their  ac- 
counts. I  have  taken  for  granted  that  our  dull  girls  are 
willing  to  study,  and  that  they  have  the  opportunity  to  do 
so.  In  that  case  they  can  accomplish  more  than  the 
bright  ones  often  do,  if  they  are  only  determined  to  study 
essentials  and  are  not  allured  by  the  wish  to  make  a  show. 
And  they  have  one  special  advantage.     If  they  recognize 


142      CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

their  dulness,  they  are  safe  from  self-conceit,  and  that  is 
a  pitfall  which  has  destroyed  many  a  bright  girl  who 
would  otherwise  have  been  capable  of  an  earnest  and 
useful  life. 

Character  is  at  the  foundation  of  all  success.  A  dull 
girl  with  character  accomplishes,  not  the  same  thing, 
to  be  sure,  but  something  better  than  the  bright  girl 
whose  nature  is  trivial. 

Not  one  of  us  is  shut  out  from  the  best. 


XIII. 

CLEVER  GIRLS. 

THERE  are  several  dangers  which  beset  clever  girls. 
They  may  become  self-conceited,  and  they  may 
not  realize  their  responsibilities.  The  same  corrective 
may  be  supplied  in  both  these  cases.  If  you  are  clever, 
study  hard  subjects. 

Many  a  brilliant  girl  goes  on  learning  the  rudiments 
of  language  after  language,  or  accumulating  fact  after 
fact  of  history,  without  any  definite  object,  simply  from 
the  unconscious  vanity  which  makes  her  wish  to  outshine 
others.  Yet  most  people  can  learn  the  rudiments  of 
everything.  Real  power  of  mind  is  shown  in  going  be- 
yond this  point.  If  you  hope  to  do  this  however,  you 
must  first  master  the  rudiments  perfectly.  A  one-storey 
building  may  be  useful  and  picturesque  though  its  foun- 
dation is  slight,  but  it  never  will  do  to  attempt  to  rear  a 
structure  of  twelve  storeys  on  an  insecure  foundation.  If 
you  require  absolute  thoroughness  and  accuracy  of  your- 
self from  the  beginning  of  your  education,  you  will  find 
the  task  hard  enough  to  keep  you  from  self-conceit,  for 


144      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

you  will  not  be  able  to  leam  lessons  in  half  an  hour  on 
which  other  girls  must  spend  an  hour,  and  you  will  not 
take  pride  in  studying  a  dozen  branches  at  a  time  when 
your  teachers  advise  you  to  be  content  with  three  or 
four.  And  then  you  will  form  habits  which  will  make  it 
possible  for  you  to  do  some  solid  work  later  in  life.  I 
should  be  glad  to  have  you  know  twenty  languages  if  you 
like,  or  to  have  all  the  facts  of  history  at  your  instant 
command ;  but  a  clever  girl  ought  to  feel  that  she  has  a 
special  task  set  her,  that  she  must  make  the  most  that 
can  be  made  of  the  stuff.  The  world  needs  all  our  gifts. 
A  pretty  girl,  chattering  French  and  Italian  at  a  garden 
party,  may  be  quite  as  attractive  and  useful  as  an  intel- 
lectual girl  poring  over  the  philosophy  of  Hegel ;  yet  the 
girl  who  is  capable  of  reading  Hegel  should  not  fail  to 
do  so,  unless  she  is  sure  she  can  do  something  more  im- 
portant. Most  girls  cannot  comprehend  much  of  specu- 
lative philosophy.  It  is  a  study  for  mature  minds,  and 
those  of  unusual  strength.  But  a  few  girls  can  make  a 
beginning  in  this  direction  even  in  their  school  days. 
Others  can  set  themselves  the  task  for  middle  life.  It  is 
not  likely  that  any  of  my  readers  will  ever  add  original 
contributions  to  the  subject ;  but  the  enlargement  of  their 
own  minds  will  —  if  they  are  modest  and  generous  —  do 
something  for  the  enlightenment  of  the  world. 

At  all  events,  let  the  clever  girls  read  Plato,  and  not 
only  read,  but  study  him,  beginning  with  the  Apology  of 


CLEVER  GIRLS.  145 

Socrates,  which  ought  to  form  a  part  of  the  education  of 
everybody,  even  I  think  of  dull  girls. 

Logic  is  a  branch  of  philosophy  which  a  clever  girl 
cannot  afford  to  neglect  if  she  wishes  to  train  her  mind 
for  its  highest  uses. 

Many  clever  girls  have  a  love  of  literature,  and  would 
like  to  read  everything  that  has  ever  been  written  from 
the  cuneiform  inscriptions  to  the  last  of  Swinburne's 
poems.  I  admit  a  kindred  weakness.  But  would  it  not 
be  better  for  us  all  to  make  haste  slowly,  and  read  with 
more  thought  than  we  can  give  when  we  are  in  a  hurry? 

There  are  two  great  poems  which  most  school-girls 
think  beyond  them,  Dante's  "Divine  Comedy,"  and 
Goethe's  "  Faust."  On  the  other  hand,  there  are  those 
who  suppose  they  understand  them  at  first  reading. 
Girls  who  are  omnivorous  readers  will  do  well  to  begm 
the  study  of  these  poems  very  early,  and  come  back  to 
them  from  year  to  year  all  their  lives. 

Browning  is  a  poet  that  a  clever  girl  may  not  neglect. 
She  must  not  read  him  because  it  is  the  fashion,  but  be- 
cause the  message  he  brings  to  the  world  is  so  great. 
She  may  have  to  learn  every  poem  by  heart  before  she 
begins  to  see  any  meaning  in  it,  but  the  meaning  is  there. 

It  would  be  idle  for  me  to  try  to  catalogue  all  the 
kinds  of  work  a  clever  girl  may  do ;  but  it  is  necessary 
that  she  should  determine  to  do  real  work,  and  not  be 
content  with  simply  acquiring,  —  that  is  to  say,  she  must 

lo 


146      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

be  willing  to  think.  Her  own  tastes  and  abilities  will  de- 
cide her  special  line  of  study.  And  if  possible,  she 
ought  to  do  some  original  work.  There  is  however 
one  branch  of  investigation  I  wish  to  call  particular 
attention  to,  for  it  is  of  the  deepest  interest  to  women, 
and  it  is  so  difficult  that  only  a  clever  woman  can  hope 
to  make  much  headway  in  it.  Moreover  it  would  fur- 
nish a  safeguard  against  a  third  danger  which  threatens 
gifted  girls,  —  the  danger  that  they  will  allow  themselves 
to  be  so  absorbed  in  study  as  to  forget  their  fellow- 
creatures.     This  study  is  social  science. 

It  is  said  that  whereas  the  preponderance  of  elective 
study  a  few  years  ago  at  Harvard  was  in  the  direction  of 
literature,  it  is  now  in  that  of  political  economy.  Social 
science  and  political  economy  are  two  branches  of  the 
same  subject,  both  of  which  are  necessary ;  but  just  at 
present  women  are  and  possibly  need  to  be  most  occu- 
pied with  social  science.  The  complexity  of  modern  life 
makes  it  often  essential  that  we  should  understand  the 
working  of  far-reaching  laws  of  economics  in  order  that 
some  of  our  very  commonplace  acts  may  do  good  and 
not  harm.  You  remember  how  Dorothea  in  "  Middle- 
march  "  wished  to  learn  political  economy  so  that  she 
might  work  for  the  poor  without  injuring  them.  A  great 
many  American  girls  sympathize  with  her.  It  is  bitter 
to  them  to  refuse  a  beggar  on  the  street  because  the  Asso- 
ciated Charities  have  warned  them  it  is  wrong  to  give 


CLEVER  GIRLS.  I47 

alms  in  that  way.  They  are  balked  at  every  turn  by 
some  scientific  friend  who  tells  them  they  will  undermine 
the  characters  of  the  poor  and  plunge  the  nation  into  dis- 
tress if  they  follow  the  generous  promptings  of  their  own 
hearts.  They  feel  like  Mr.  Howells's  "  Annie  Kilburn," 
after  she  had  tried  in  vain  to  use  her  money  for  the  good 
of  others,  that  it  is  mere  impertinence  to  ask  a  tramp  to 
saw  wood  before  giving  him  a  breakfast,  since  they  have 
their  own  dinner  of  many  courses  without  lifting  a  finger 
themselves. 

I  will  risk  attempting  to  define  the  spheres  of  political 
economy  and  social  science.  Even  if  I  misunderstand 
the  terms,  it  will  not  be  of  much  consequence,  for  I  shall 
at  least  make  clear,  I  hope,  just  what  it  is  that  girls  need 
to  know  in  this  department  of  study.  Political  economy 
seeks  to  benefit  the  whole  civilized  world  by  laying  down 
the  laws  which  govern  the  production  and  distribution  of 
material  wealth.  Individuals  must  often  be  sacrificed  to 
the  general  good.  Social  science,  on  the  other  hand, 
seeks  to  promote  the  true  welfare  of  every  individual 
both  materially  and  spiritually ;  but  in  its  choice  between 
means  in  themselves  equally  worthy,  it  must  use  those 
which  by  helping  one  individual  at  a  given  time  will  not 
injure  many  more  for  a  longer  time.  Such  a  problem 
was  not  so  hard  a  few  generations  ago,  when  each  little 
community  was  sufficient  to  itself,  and  everybody  knew 
the  needs  and  capacities  of  any  one  he  was  called  upon 


148      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

to  help.  But  now  when  the  price  of  grain  in  Chicago 
may  cause  a  child  to  starv^e  to  death  in  London,  the 
problem  is  one  of  the  gravest  difficulty.  The  most  en- 
lightened political  economy  is  not  yet  competent  to  solve 
it,  but  it  is  very  important  that  all  of  us  should  act  up  to 
the  highest  positive  knowledge  yet  gained  by  the  most 
powerful  minds.  And  so  it  seems  to  me  necessary  that 
even  girls  should  begin  to  study  political  economy. 
Nevertheless  there  is  such  a  strong  tendency  among  men 
to  forget  individuals  while  theorizing  about  the  masses, 
that  it  is  even  more  important  for  women  to  keep  the 
balance  by  laying  great  stress  on  social  science.  If  we 
are  ready  to  help  individuals  whenever  and  wherever  we 
can,  if  we  are  ready  to  enter  into  the  lives  of  others  and 
always  give  the  best  we  have  to  give  whether  of  money 
or  time  or  thought  or  character,  it  will  certainly  be  better 
than  if  we  began  to  study  at  the  other  end,  and  never 
went  far  enough  to  get  at  the  individual  at  all.  There 
are  those  who  think  that  loving-kindness  will  do  every- 
thing, and  it  is  indeed  one  of  the  most  potent  forces  in 
the  universe.  Still,  if  every  man  and  woman  in  Boston 
were  alive  with  love  to  all  his  fellow-creatures  and  some 
railroad  accident  should  cut  off  the  city's  supply  of  fresh 
milk  for  a  few  days,  many  little  children  would  die.  Lov- 
ing-kindness is  indeed  f^ir  better  than  food,  but  what  sort 
of  loving-kindness  would  that  be  which  neglected  to  find 
out  the  laws  necessary  to  supply  the  babies  with  milk? 


CLEVER  GIRLS.  I49 

Girls  then  are  to  learn  social  science  by  working  for 
individuals ;  but  in  order  that  they  may  work  to  the  best 
purpose,  they  need  to  learn  something  of  political 
economy. 

This  is  a  very  difficult  study,  requiring  a  strong  mind, 
trained  judgment,  and  perseverance.  A  great  many  men 
and  women  cannot  make  anything  out  of  it  j  and  indeed 
new  problems  are  arising  constantly  in  these  days  which 
show  that  the  questions  we  had  supposed  answered  once 
for  all  were  answered  without  full  data,  so  that  it  is  any- 
thing but  an  exact  science.  Why  should  a  girl  lose  her- 
self in  its  intricacies?  I  am  forced  to  admit  that  it  is 
beyond  the  range  of  most  girls.  A  slight  study  of  it  is 
almost  worse  than  none.  It  certainly  is  so  unless  the 
student  has  the  rare  balance  of  character  which  allows 
her  to  realize  that  she  must  see  a  scientific  fact  or  theory 
on  all  sides  and  test  it  in  all  lights  before  she  has  a  right 
to  be  sure  of  it.  Only  a  girl  who  is  intellectually  modest 
should  begin  the  study,  and  then  only  if  she  is  willing  to 
go  on  with  it  all  her  life. 

Nevertheless,  as  I  think  there  is  no  inherent  reason 
why  girls  may  not  do  at  least  as  much  as  their  brothers 
in  this  direction,  —  for  boys,  too,  are  stupid  and  one- 
sided, —  and  as  women  sorely  need  this  knowledge  for 
much  of  the  practical  work  which  is  coming  so  largely 
into  their  hands,  I  do  wish  that  every  girl  who  knows 
that  she  has  a  strong  brain,  and  who  feels  that  she  has 


150      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

determination  enough  to  cany  on  hard  work  for  many 
years,  would  make  a  systematic  study  of  political  economy. 
I  say  systematic,  because  to  study  one  question  —  the 
land  question,  for  instance  —  by  itself  would  be  like 
trying  to  solve  a  problem  in  the  sixth  book  of  Euclid 
when  you  knew  nothing  about  the  first  book.  But  while 
in  geometry  one  step  leads  irresistibly  to  another,  no 
one  yet  has  produced  a  scheme  of  political  economy 
which  has  no  flaw  in  its  reasoning.  So,  while  you  may 
go  on  in  considerable  security  in  geometry  if  you  remem- 
ber your  results  even  if  you  forget  your  methods  of  prov- 
ing each  theorem,  it  is  not  so  in  political  economy.  A 
fallacy  which  you  could  not  see  at  the  beginning  may 
bring  you  into  fatal  error  at  the  end  if  you  have  not  so 
made  every  step  of  the  reasoning  your  own  that  you  can 
recall  it  with  ease  at  any  moment. 

Many  years  ago  John  Stuart  Mill  wrote  what  is  con- 
sidered by  most  thinkers  the  standard  treatise  on  politi- 
cal economy.  He  had  a  powerful  and  logical  mind  ;  and 
gathered  up  the  result  of  previous  thinkers,  and  not  only 
presented  them  clearly,  but  added  much  valuable  matter 
of  his  own.  No  one  of  equal  ability  has  written  on  the 
subject  since  ;  so  his  work  is  still  the  treatise  to  be  com- 
pletely mastered  first  by  one  who  wishes  to  know  any- 
thing in  earnest  of  political   economy. 

But  since  his  day,  advancing  civiHzation  has  changed 
the  aspect  of  the  world.     He  scarcely  alludes  to  many 


CLEVER  GIRLS.  15I 

of  the  burning  questions  of  the  present  time.  Moreover, 
thoughtful  critics  have  been  able  to  show  that  there  are 
joints  even  in  his  shining  armour ;  so  that  if  you  were  to 
conquer  Mill  and  stop  there,  you  would  hardly  be  any 
better  fitted  for  your  own  personal  duties  than  you  are 
now. 

After  you  have  mastered  Mill  however,  you  will  be  in 
a  condition  to  attack  any  one  of  the  current  questions 
which  particularly  interests  you.  Every  few  years  some 
new  book  appears  which  attracts  wide  attention,  —  such 
a  book  for  instance  as  Henry  George's  "  Progress  and 
Poverty'*  or  Bellamy's  "Looking  Backward."  Now, 
whether  the  theories  of  these  writers  are  correct  or  not, 
they  have  to  be  fully  understood  by  any  of  us  who  hope 
to  solve  the  problems  of  the  day,  because  their  influence 
is  so  great.  Unless  we  ourselves  understand  them,  we 
cannot  deal  intelligently  with  the  mass  of  men  and 
women  who  are  their  eager  champions.  So  even  if  such 
books  prove  to  be  short-lived  by  reason  of  their  errors, 
the  student  of  political  economy  must  give  them  serious 
attention ;  and  after  reading  the  books  themselves,  it  is 
necessary  to  read  such  answers  to  them  as  are  made  by 
men  of  integrity  and  power.  It  may  be  that  we  have 
been  carried  away  by  brilliant  reasoning  whose  fallacies 
were  too  subtile  for  us  to  discover.  On  the  other  hand 
it  may  be  the  answers  will  seem  less  convincing  than  the 
original  argument.     Or  it  may  be  they  will  simply  clear 


152      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

away  the  fallacies,  and  leave  the  main  argument  irresisti- 
ble. It  will  never  do  to  accept  any  new  theory  without 
this  conscientious  study,  and  it  will  seldom  do  to  accept 
any  without  qualifications. 

It  will  be  thought  I  have  made  a  very  short  list  of 
books  on  these  subjects.  The  actual  list  of  those  worth 
reading  is  very  long,  but  all  I  can  hope  to  do  is  to  start 
a  few  earnest  intellectual  girls  in  a  pathway  which  need 
not  be  retraced.  I  think  a  great  deal  of  this  solid  read- 
ing is  necessary  as  a  foundation  before  a  woman  —  or  a 
man  either  for  that  matter  —  can  be  prepared  to  consi- 
der the  economic  questions  discussed  in  the  newspapers 
at  all. 

Most  of  us  would  be  much  helped  in  such  study,  if  we 
could  discuss  every  question  fully  with  other  intelligent 
people  before  we  made  up  our  minds  on  it.  In  many 
places  there  are  political  clubs  for  this  purpose.  I  know 
a  clear-minded  woman  who  started  one  in  a  small  coun- 
try town,  and  it  became  a  centre  of  practical  thought 
and  action  for  all  the  sensible  and  honest  people  of  the 
region.  But  alas  !  many  of  us  —  and  here  I  must  con- 
fess I  am  afraid  women  fail  oftcner  than  men  —  make  up 
our  minds  on  a  question  with  very  little  thought  or  study, 
and  then  get  angry  with  everybody  who  does  not  agree 
with  us. 


T 


XIV. 

MORAL  CULTURE. 

HOUGH  most  of  the  previous  chapters  have  been 
given  to  the  culture  of  the  mind,  I  hope  I  have 
made  it  clear  that  this  can  have  no  real  value  unless 
every  intellectual  question  is  decided  by  moral  standards. 
Indeed  it  is  difficult  to  speak  of  moral  training  by  itself. 
We  are  to  do  right ;  but  a  very  large  number  of  the  par- 
ticular duties  we  ought  to  do  depend  on  our  mental  de- 
velopment, and  others  still  on  our  physical  condition,  — 
for  which  we  are  often  responsible.  We  show  our  moral 
character  through  our  bodies  and  our  minds  much 
oftener  than  we  sometimes  like  to  admit. 

There  are  broad  moral  principles,  however,  which 
we  must  first  recognize  and  then  act  upon,  though  we 
may  seem  to  apply  them  to  things  as  trivial  as  ventilating 
a  room  or  learning  an  arithmetic  lesson. 

The  three  essential  qualities  of  a  moral  character  are 
right  feeling,  right  thinking,  and  right  doing.  I  am 
rather  inclined  to  think  that  we  have  more  power  to  do 
right  than  to  feel   aright  or  even  to  think  aright,  and 


154     CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

SO  I  shall  begin  this  part  of  my  subject  by  a  chapter  on 
the  culture  of  the  will. 

Right  thinking  involves  good  judgment.  This  is 
largely  an  intellectual  quality ;  but  the  resolution  to  take 
the  pains  needed  to  form  a  good  judgment  belongs  to 
the  moral  nature,  and  it  is  by  constantly  using  our  will 
in  carrying  out  those  plans  which  our  judgment  approves 
that  we  gain  the  poise  of  mind  which  helps  us  to  think 
truly  on  all  matters.  For  this  reason,  I  shall  next  give  a 
chapter  to  culture  in  justice,  which  I  believe  involves 
culture  in  truthfulness. 

It  is  harder  to  reach  the  feelings  than  either  the  deeds 
or  the  thoughts.  I  mean  it  is  a  harder  task  to  change 
our  own  feelings  than  either  to  do  our  duty  or  to  decide 
correctly  what  we  ought  to  do.  Of  course,  if  we  are  ex- 
citable, we  may  be  very  easily  touched  by  the  words  or 
acts  of  other  people,  and  in  that  case  we  ought  to  be 
very  careful  to  place  ourselves  always  among  those  influ- 
ences which  rouse  our  best  feelings.  But  self-culture 
includes  the  attempt  to  cultivate  our  best  feelings  our- 
selves. In  the  broad  sense  '*  Love  is  the  fulfilling  of  the 
law,"  so  that  the  little  I  feel  able  to  say  on  this  branch 
of  my  subject  I  shall  say  in  a  chapter  on  the  cultivation 
of  a  spirit  of  love. 

I  do  not  feel  quite  sure  that  all  girls  —  even  all  good 
girls  —  are  entirely  convinced  that  goodness  is  the  one 


MORAL  CULTURE.  15$ 

thing  needful  Alma,  the  gifted  young  artist  in  "A 
Hazard  of  New  Fortunes,"  exclaims  impatiently  in  refer- 
ence to  the  quotation  "Be  good,  sweet  child,  and  let 
who  will  be  clever,"  "  Just  as  if  any  girl  would  care  about 
being  good  who  had  the  least  chance  of  being  clever  ! " 
That  is  rather  an  extreme  statement.  Alma  was  on  the 
whole  a  very  good  girl  herself.  I  think  it  is  rarely  the  case 
that  a  clever  girl  goes  far  wrong,  —  at  least  according 
to  the  common  standards.  And  yet  Alma  did  speak  out 
the  feeling  of  a  great  many  bright  girls  who  have  a  vague 
idea  that  in  some  way  —  just  how  they  would  find  it  hard 
to  tell  —  their  brightness  is  more  than  an  equivalent  for 
goodness.  They  have  unconsciously  the  same  kind  of 
foolish  vanity  which  makes  so  many  handsome  girls  intol- 
erable because  they  assume  that  their  beauty  is  a  suffi- 
cient contribution  to  the  world  from  them,  and  that  they 
need  add  to  it  neither  sweetness  nor  brightness.  But  if 
a  clever  girl  is  not  better  than  a  stupid  one,  she  is  neces- 
sarily worse  through  the  waste  of  better  powers. 

The  founders  of  the  first  boarding-schools  for  girls 
which  were  established  in  Massachusetts,  such  as  that  of 
Miss  Grant  and  Miss  Lyon  at  Ipswich,  the  Wheaton 
Seminary  at  Norton,  Abbot  Academy  at  Andover,  Brad- 
ford Academy,  Mount  Holyoke  Seminary,  and  others,  rec- 
ognized the  fact  that  the  moral  nature  is  higher  than  the 
intellectual,  though  they  were  ready  to  make  great  sacri- 
fices for  a  better  mental   development.     Such  schools, 


156      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

and  those  upon  the  same  plan  that  sprang  up  all  over 
the  country,  have  always  stood  firm  for  that  idea,  and 
have  scorned  any  system  of  training  in  which  character 
and  intellect  did  not  go  hand  in  hand.  It  must  be 
admitted  that  they  have  sometimes  held  a  narrow  creed, 
and  have  made  mistakes  of  judgment ;  but  no  creed  is 
so  stultifying  as  worldliness,  and  these  schools  have  always 
been  essentially  Christian. 

In  some  of  these  schools  it  used  to  be  the  custom,  and 
perhaps  it  is  so  still,  to  send  home  reports  not  only  of 
the  scholarship  of  the  pupils  but  of  their  conduct, 
promptness,  care  of  health,  care  of  wardrobe,  care  of 
room,  and  the  cash  account.  Some  of  the  clever  girls 
were  impatient  of  such  oversight.  If  their  reports 
for  scholarship  stood  high  they  troubled  themselves 
very  little  about  holes  in  their  stockings  or  dust  in 
the  comers  of  their  rooms.  I  remember  once  hearing 
a  group  of  girls  discussing  the  matter.  They  were 
all  bright  and  neat  and  pretty  and  well-intcniioncd 
girls ;  but  some  of  them  thought  no  harm  was  done  if 
they  saved  their  stockings  for  their  mothers  to  mend, 
or  if  they  ate  candy  without  permission,  or  if  they  whis- 
pered to  their  room-mates  after  the  bell  for  the  lights  to 
be  put  out  at  night.  One  of  them,  however,  was  of  a 
different  mind.  She  was  the  most  beautiful  girl  of  tne 
group.  I  see  her  now  as  she  stood  among  them,  stately 
and  fair,  with  her  golden  hair  and  deep  blue  eyes.     She 


MORAL  CULTURE.  157 

was  also  one  of  the  most  intellectual  of  the  girls,  and 
moreover  so  full  of  life  and  spirit  and  fun  that  she  was 
popular  even  with  those  of  her  schoolmates  who  could 
not  endure  "  a  dig."  And  this  is  what  she  said  :  *^  I  should 
hate  to  fail  in  a  lesson ;  but  I  should  feel  a  great  deal 
worse  not  to  have  a  perfect  mark  for  care  of  room,  or 
wardrobe,  or  for  any  of  those  things." 

**How  can  you  say  so,  Mary?"  cried  a  lively  girl. 
**  When  the  teachers  are  so  fussy,  too  !  " 

"Why,  don't  you  see,"  returned  Mary,  very  earnestly, 
"  I  might  try  my  best,  and  still  fail  in  a  lesson.  I  might 
not  understand  it,  or  I  might  forget.  When  my  father 
and  mother  see  my  report,  of  course  they  think  of  that. 
But  I  can  be  prompt,  and  I  can  keep  all  the  rules ;  so  if  I 
have  low  marks  in  my  general  report,  they  will  know  that 
I  am  to  blame.  I  could  not  bear  to  send  home  such  a 
report  as  that." 

I  think  she  was  right.  Perhaps  the  rules  were  too 
stringent,  and  their  multiplicity  may  sometimes  have 
made  the  girls  nervous ;  though  for  that  matter,  if  all  the 
girls  had  had  Mary's  spirit,  the  rules  could  soon  have 
been  modified.  The  point,  however,  is  this  :  we  ought 
to  care  more  for  the  kind  of  excellence  which  depends 
on  our  own  will  than  for  that  which  depends  on  our  nat- 
ural gifts,  for  it  is  the  will  which  gives  a  moral  quality  to 
an  act. 

This  is  the  spirit  which  I  should  like  to  see  animating 


158      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

not  only  every  girl,  but  every  man,  woman,  and  child.  It 
is  akin  to  religion.  Perhaps  it  is  the  strongest  element 
in  religion,  for  it  is  the  "  consecration  of  ourselves  to  the 
best."  The  feeling  of  dependence  on  the  mighty  Love 
which  rules  the  universe,  which  is  the  blossom  of  the 
religious  life,  is  not  always  within  our  power,  and  so  not 
essential,  though  so  precious ;  but  the  determination  to 
hold  fast  to  the  highest  we  know  may  always  be  ours,  and 
with  this  strong  root  in  the  soil,  the  plant  cannot  fail  at 
last  to  blossom. 

Universal  Love  does  enfold  us  even  when  we  are  un- 
conscious of  it ;  and  so,  if  we  hold  ourselves  ready  to 
receive  it,  the  blessing  always  descends  upon  us  at  last. 
The  opening  of  our  hearts  and  minds  to  the  best  is  es- 
sentially prayer,  the  kind  of  prayer  which  should  be 
"  without  ceasing,"  and  which  is  possible  in  the  midst 
even  of  an  anxious  crowd.  But  it  is  so  much  easier  to 
recover  a  high  tone  of  mind  when  we  are  quiet  and 
alone  that  those  of  us  who  are  in  earnest  in  our  wish 
for  the  best  life  will  not  lightly  suffer  the  days  to  go  by 

without  — 

•'  Some  part 

Free  for  a  Sabbath  of  the  heart." 

It  is  not  always  easy  to  find  time  to  be  alone.  In  the 
old-flishioned  boarding-schools  I  have  spoken  of,  it  was 
the  first  thing  arranged  for  on  the  programme  of  daily 
occupations,  and  necessarily  so ;  for  where  several  girls 


MORAL  CULTURE.  15*9 

occupied  the  same  room,  it  would  have  been  almost  im- 
possible for  any  of  them  to  depend  upon  a  moment 
alone  if  there  had  not  been  some  definite  portion  set 
apart  for  "silent  time." 

A  woman  who  orders  her  own  household  ought  to  re- 
member this  great  need,  and  try  to  make  room  for  it. 
But  some  of  us  do  not  have  the  ordering  of  our  days. 
We  are  claimed  by  imperative  duties  from  the  moment 
we  wake  till  we  sink  exhausted  at  night.  The  only  quiet 
possible  to  us  is  inward  quiet  —  and  for  that  we  must 
strive  hard. 

In  Charlotte  Bronte's  story  "  Villette,"  little  Paulina 
de  Bassompierre  is  represented  as  speaking  with  beauti- 
ful simplicity  of  a  letter  she  had  received  from  her  lover 
directly  after  breakfast.  She  held  it  in  her  hand  a  few 
moments,  thinking  it  too  soon  "  to  drink  that  draught," 
for  "the  sparkle  in  the  cup  was  too  beautiful."  She 
says :  — 

"  Then  I  remembered  all  at  once  that  I  had  not  said  my 
prayers  that  morning.  Having  heard  Papa  go  down  to 
breakfast  a  litde  earlier  than  usual,  I  had  been  afraid  of  keep- 
ing him  waiting,  and  had  hastened  to  join  him  as  soon  as 
dressed,  thinking  no  harm  to  put  oft  my  prayers  till  after- 
wards. Some  people  would  say  I  ought  to  have  served  God 
first  and  then  man ;  but  I  don't  think  Heaven  could  be  jeal- 
ous of  anything  I  might  do  for  Papa.  I  believe  I  am  super- 
stitious. A  voice  seemed  now  to  say  that  another  feeling 
than  filial  affection  was  in  question ;  to  urge  me  to  pray  be- 
fore I  dared  to  read  what  I  so  longed  to  read ;  to  deny  myself 


l60      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

yet  a  moment,  and  remember  first  a  great  duty.  I  put  the 
letter  down  and  said  my  prayers,  adding  at  the  end  a  strong 
entreaty  that  whatever  happened,  I  might  not  be  tempted  or 
led  to  cause  Papa  any  sorrow,  and  might  never,  in  caring  for 
others,  neglect  him." 

"  Saying  prayers  "  is  not  always  a  duty ;  but  who  can 
read  Paulina's  simple  words  without  feeling  that  she  made 
the  true  choice  between  active  goodness  and  quiet  com- 
munion with  the  Spirit  of  Goodness  ? 


XV. 

THE   TRAINING   OF  THE   WILL. 

T  DO  not  feel  that  it  is  my  place  to  discuss  the  knotty 

problem  of  the  freedom  of  the  will.     Whether  we 

are  free  or  not,  it  is  always  wholesome  to  act  as  if  we 

were  free.     This  is  the  doctrine  not  only  of  so  great  a 

philosopher  as  Kant,  but  the  principle  of  every  man  or 

woman  who  leads  a  life  of  moral  growth. 

"  When  duty  whispers  low,  'Thou  must!' 
The  youth  replies,  '  I  can.' " 

Every  time  we  act  upon  this  principle,  we  make  it 
easier  to  act  upon  it  again.  In  this  way,  we  become 
constantly  freer  and  freer  to  do  right !  We  cannot  al- 
ways control  our  feelings  or  our  thoughts  or  our  judg- 
ments. We  cannot  even  always  do  what  we  know  we 
ought  to  do  and  what  we  try  to  do,  for  we  have  not  al- 
ways moral  force  enough  to  carry  out  our  attempt.  But 
if  we  keep  on  trying,  we  shall  have  more  and  more  suc- 
cess. In  striving  for  a  moral  victory,  it  is  not  possible 
to  lose  the  battle.     The  battle  is  the  victory. 

Many  years   ago   Dr.  Andrew   Peabody   preached   a 

baccalaureate  sermon  at  Harvard  College  on  this  subject. 

II 


l62      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

I  did  not  hear  the  sermon,  and  do  not  even  know  his 
text,  but  I  know  his  argument  in  the  most  practical  way, 
through  hearing  it  quoted  again  and  again  by  a  young 
girl  on  whom  it  made  a  great  impression.  He  said  that 
we  often  excused  ourselves  for  wrong  deeds  and  words 
on  the  ground  that  temptation  came  to  us  suddenly,  and 
that  we  acted  involuntarily  before  we  had  time  to  rally 
our  forces.  He  admitted  this  as  a  valid  excuse  for  those 
particular  acts  and  words ;  but  he  said  that  the  true  re- 
sponsibility lay  further  back,  —  that  temptations  were 
continually  coming  to  us  when  we  did  have  time  to  think ; 
that  if  we  yielded  to  these,  we  not  only  did  wrong  at 
once,  but  that  we  weakened  the  moral  fibre  so  that  we 
did  wrong  in  other  instances  when  we  had  no  lime  to 
think ;  and  that  if  we  resisted  the  temptation  when  we 
could  resist,  we  were  forming  a  habit  of  feeling  and  action 
which  would  by  and  by  help  us  to  do  right  unhesitatingly 
and  spontaneously. 

So  Emerson  says,  *'  The  unremitting  retention  of 
simple  and  high  sentiments  in  obscure  duties  is  harden- 
ing the  character  to  that  temper  which  will  work  with 
honour  if  need  be  in  the  tumult  or  on  the  scaffold." 
And  Carlyle  quotes  Goethe  :  *'  Do  the  duty  which  lies 
nearest  thee  :  thy  second  duty  will  already  have  become 
clearer."  And  so  on  and  so  on.  But  it  is  life  we  need 
more  than  quotations.  There  is  not  much  to  be  said, 
after  all,  and  yet  I  wish  I  knew  how  to  say  something  so 


THE  TRAINING  OF  THE  WILL.  163 

Strong  that  it  would  cling  to  every  girl's  memory  and  in- 
sist on  being  obeyed. 

We  do  not  wish  to  be  wilful ;  we  wish  to  have  a  will 
so  firm  that  it  can  never  yield  to  wrong,  but  so  firm  that 
it  yields  instantly  to  right,  —  a  perfectly  disciplined  will. 
It  is  the  untrained  horse  that  balks  or  that  shies ;  but  the 
thorough-bred  horse  stands  still  the  moment  his  master 
speaks,  and  he  turns  to  the  right  or  left  at  the  lightest 
touch  of  the  bridle. 

Obstinacy  is  the  determination  to  have  our  own  way ; 
firmness  is  the  determination  to  take  the  right  way. 
One  who  has  a  firm  will  purposely  gives  up  non-essentials 
in  order  to  have  more  power  in  essentials. 

In  "  Framley  Parsonage  "  Trollope  describes  an  English 
clergyman  as  making  a  stand  against  the  great  lady  of 
the  parish  in  a  trifling  matter.  His  wife  begs  him  to 
yield,  for  she  says  if  he  gains  his  own  way  in  this,  he 
will  hardly  have  the  courage  to  make  another  stand  at 
once,  and  yet  that  he  is  sure  to  have  occasion  to  do  so 
soon,  and  very  likely  in  the  next  case  a  principle  will  be 
involved.  But  the  clergyman  persists,  and  the  result  is 
just  what  his  wife  predicted.  Indeed,  he  is  almost  forced 
to  give  up  a  principle  in  the  end  because  he  would  not 
give  up  a  fancy  in  the  beginning.  His  will  was  weak 
all  through,  as  weak  when  he  was  headstrong  and  insisted 
on  having  his  own  way  as  when  he  was  forced  to  give 
it  up. 


1 64     CHATS  WITH  GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

There  is  a  kind  of  strong  will  which  spends  itself  in 

controlling  others.     "  Is  Mr. king  of  this  town  ?  " 

asked  a  young  man  not  long  ago.  Such  a  will  may  be 
cultivated,  but  it  ends  in  moral  degradation.  In  some 
cases,  indeed,  it  is  our  duty  to  control  others.  A  mother 
must  control  a  child,  and  a  teacher  her  scholars.  There 
are  upright  men  of  sound  intellect  who  know  they  ought 
to  make  their  influence  felt  in  public  affairs.  However 
weak  and  incapable  we  may  feel,  we  have  no  right  to 
shirk  any  responsibility  which  plainly  belongs  to  us.  We 
must  try  to  do  our  part  even  if  we  end  in  failure. 

But  most  girls  at  least  do  not  have  such  a  task  set 
them.  Their  task  is  to  train  their  own  will  sometimes 
to  yield  to  others  cheerfully,  sometimes  to  do  a  difficult 
act. 

One  of  my  friends  was  once  very  ill  for  many  weeks. 
At  last  she  began  to  improve,  and  one  day  the  doctors 
said  she  ought  to  get  up.  She  was  a  woman  of  great 
energy  and  courage,  but  she  thought  it  would  be  impos- 
sible to  obey  them.  She  was  so  weak  and  sore  and 
racked  with  pain  that  she  could  only  turn  her  face  away 
to  hide  the  tears.  But  the  doctors  urged  the  point ; 
they  told  her  that  the  disease  had  been  checked,  though 
she  could  not  realize  it,  and  that  the  weakness  and  suf- 
fering she  now  felt  were  due  to  the  nervous  strain.  She 
understood  them  and  believed  them,  but  she   still  felt 


THE  TRAINING  OF  THE  WILL.  1 65 

that  she  could  not  move.  She  asked  them  to  lift  her  up 
and  make  her  walk.  They  told  her  that  would  do  no 
good,  for  the  time  had  come  when  she  must  use  her 
will  or  she  would  be  bedridden  for  life.  And  then  she 
summoned  all  her  powers,  and  succeeded  in  moving. 
She  told  me  that  she  had  never  suffered  such  agony  in 
her  life.  Yet  she  gradually  won  the  victory  over  her 
nerves,  and  was  saved  from  the  fate  which  had  almost 
overwhelmed  her.  I  have  related  this  anecdote  to  show 
what  the  will  can  do  to  control  the  body ;  but  it  has  a 
moral  significance.  Some  nervous  invalids  could  not 
have  done  what  she  did,  not  because  they  were  really 
more  diseased,  but  because  they  had  not  previously 
trained  their  will  to  perfect  obedience  to  duty.  My 
friend  had  disciplined  her  will  all  her  life.  It  was  be- 
cause she  had  accustomed  her  body  in  health  to  obey 
the  light  tasks  set  it  by  her  reason,  that  she  was  able  to 
command  its  obedience  when  a  feather  would  have  turned 
the  scale  against  her. 

Her  act  was  the  physical  counterpart  of  what  Matthew 
Arnold  means  when  he  says,  — 

"  We  cannot  kindle  when  we  will 
The  fire  that  in  the  heart  resides, 
But  tasks  in  hours  of  insight  willed 
Can  be  in  hours  of  gloom  fulfilled." 

The  power  of  will  is  sometimes  thought  to  belong  only 
to  those  who  are  highly  developed  mentally ;  but  one  of 


1 66      CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

the  finest  instances  of  it  I  have  ever  seen  myself  was  in  a 
little  boy  in  a  school  for  the  feeble-minded.  This  child 
was  about  twelve  years  old  when  he  was  sent  to  the 
school,  and  at  that  time  he  had  scarcely  learned  to  talk. 
He  had  a  curious  fancy  for  a  flat-iron.  It  is  very  com- 
mon for  a  feeble-minded  child  to  have  some  such  fancy, 
and  as  long  as  it  is  indulged  it  is  almost  impossible  to 
teach  him  anything ;  so  that  as  soon  as  his  teacher  dis- 
covered his  peculiarity,  she  took  care  not  to  allow  him 
to  see  a  flat-iron.  Under  these  circumstances,  he  began 
to  learn  something,  though  slowly  and  with  great  diffi- 
culty. It  soon  appeared  that  ignorant  and  deficient  as 
he  was,  he  was  docile  and  ambitious.  These  two  quaU- 
ties  are  very  rare  among  children  like  him.  But  from 
time  to  time  he  would  suddenly  lapse  into  his  old  dense 
stupidity,  and  no  longer  seem  to  make  any  effort  to 
emerge  from  it.  This  was  usually  caused  by  the  sight 
of  a  flat-iron.  Even  the  picture  of  one  would  make  him 
look  incredibly  silly.  Once  for  several  weeks  he  re- 
mained inaccessible  to  all  the  efforts  of  his  teacher,  until 
she  finally  discovered  the  reason.  He  had  found  a  flat- 
iron,  which  he  kept  in  his  desk.  She  took  it  away  from 
him,  and  talked  seriously  with  him.  She  did  make  him 
understand  that  he  could  not  improve  as  long  as  he  in- 
dulged his  monomania.  He  shed  many  tears,  for  he 
had  a  terribly  sincere  ambition,  though  its  flight  was  not 
high ;  still,  when  it  came  to  the  question  of  giving  up 


THE  TRAINING  OF  THE  WILL.  167 

the  flat-iron  he  could  not  consent;  he  thought  he 
would  rather  keep  it  even  if  he  never  learned  anything. 
It  was  however  taken  away,  and  gradually  his  own  in- 
terest in  his  pursuits  returned.  They  were  simple  pur- 
suits. He  learned  to  build  a  block  house,  to  draw  the 
picture  of  a  castle  on  the  blackboard,  to  write  his  name, 
to  string  beads  according  to  a  definite  pattern;  he 
even  began  to  learn  to  read.  He  made  such  steady 
progress  that  his  teacher  often  gratified  him  by  calling 
him  a  '*  big  boy,"  — a  term  which  he  considered  to  con- 
vey the  highest  praise. 

At  last,  however,  came  another  relapse.  The  teacher 
searched  his  desk  and  found  nothing.  She  frowned  upon 
him  and  called  him  a  "  little  boy ;  "  but  all  in  vain.  He 
wept,  but  continued  to  be  silly  and  inattentive.  Just  as 
she  was  almost  at  the  end  of  her  truly  sublime  patience, 
however,  he  came  up  to  her  one  day,  hanging  his  head 
in  a  shamefaced  way,  and  put  into  her  hands  a  flat-iron 
without  a  handle  which  he  had  been  secretly  carrying 
about  under  his  jacket.  ''  Me  not  little  boy  any  more," 
he  said,  with  downcast  eyes.  She  felt  that  in  an  instant 
the  clouds  had  rolled  away  and  the  victory  was  won. 
And  so  it  proved.  He  never  again,  of  his  own  accord, 
touched  a  flat-iron,  though  sometimes  he  saw  one  acci- 
dentally, and  it  never  failed  to  exert  the  old  influence 
upon  him.  Two  years  later,  by  dint  of  infinite  pains  on 
the  part  of  both  his  teacher  and  himself,  he  had  learned 


1 68     CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

to  read  a  little  in  a  primer ;  but  even  then  he  could  not 
speak  plainly.  "  Now,  Robert,"  said  his  teacher,  at  the 
beginning  of  a  new  year,  "  it  is  time  to  pronounce  your 
words  clearly."  Robert  smiled  and  nodded.  He  stood 
up  as  he  had  been  taught  to  do,  placed  his  heels  together 
at  an  angle  of  forty-five  degrees,  held  up  his  head,  threw 
his  shoulders  back,  placed  his  book  at  exactly  the  right 
distance  from  his  eyes,  and  was  ready  to  begin.  The 
teacher  said  aftenvards  that  it  was  pathetic  to  see  how 
perfectly  he  remembered  everything  she  had  taught  him 
the  year  before,  and  how  anxious  he  was  to  obey  her  to 
the  letter.  She  said  it  humbled  her  to  think  that  she  was 
so  much  less  eager  to  use  her  greater  powers  in  the  very 
best  way.  The  first  sentence  in  his  lesson  was,  "  The 
leaves  are  green."  He  could  not  pronounce  the  word 
*'  leaves  ;  "  he  called  it  *'  neeves."  The  teacher  repeated 
it  again  and  again,  **  L-eaves."  "  L-eaves  are  neen," 
said  the  boy,  with  the  utmost  care.  "G-r-een,"  said 
the  teacher,  pronouncing  the  first  letters  phonetically. 
"G-r-een,"  said  the  boy,  patiently.  They  went  on  so  for 
a  few  minutes,  when  the  teacher  noticed  that  the  child 
seemed  to  breathe  with  difficulty.  *'  You  need  not  read 
any  more  if  you  are  tired,"  she  said  ;  but  the  boy  signified 
his  desire  to  go  on.  He  held  himself  erect,  he  did  not 
falter,  but  she  saw  a  dark  and  then  an  ashen  look  come 
over  his  earnest  face.  "  Robert,"  she  said,  "  you  are  too 
tired  to  read ;  we  will  leave  the  lesson  till  to-morrow." 


THE  TRAINING  OF  THE  WILL.  1 69 

But  before  it  was  time  for  the  next  day's  lesson  Robert 
was  dead.  He  was  dying  when  he  had  raised  his  head 
so  erect,  and  had  followed  every  tone  of  his  teacher's 
voice  so  faithfully.  It  was  simply  by  the  power  of  his 
will  that  he  had  been  able  to  go  on. 

I  have  told  Robert's  story  at  length  because  it  seems  to 
me  to  show  clearly  what  can  be  done  by  a  will  set  to  do  the 
right.  I  think  that  Robert  in  his  short  life  did  a  great 
work  which  most  of  us  never  accomplish  fully,  even  with 
our  greater  gifts  and  advantages.  He  disciplined  his  will 
so  that  it  did  not  fail  him  even  at  the  extreme  moment. 

Let  me  suggest  some  points  in  his  story  which  may 
otherwise  be  overlooked.  At  first,  he  was  really  inca- 
pable of  controlling  himself.  He  did  not  know  that  a 
flat-iron  did  him  any  harm.  Even  when  he  did  know 
it,  he  had  not  the  moral  power  to  give  it  up ;  but  when 
he  was  placed  under  the  right  training,  and  the  flat-iron 
was  taken  away,  he  used  all  the  little  power  he  had  in 
obeying  his  teacher  and  in  learning  the  tasks  set  him. 
In  this  way  he  gained  new  power,  till  at  last  he  had  so 
increased  his  strength  that  he  was  able  to  make  what  was 
to  him  the  supreme  sacrifice.  After  that,  all  was  easy. 
There  was  no  longer  any  hindrance.  His  mental  powers 
were  no  better  than  before.  He  could  never  advance 
very  far,  but  he  advanced  steadily.  There  was  never 
again  a  moment  of  halting. 

His  teacher  afterwards  taught  brighter  pupils.     "  It  is 


170      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

very  hard  for  me  to  respect  my  scholars  sometimes,"  she 
said.  *^  When  I  see  how  willing  they  are  to  waste  their 
powers,  and  how  satisfied  to  do  only  half  their  duties,  I 
think  of  Robert.  If  he  had  been  gifted  as  they  are,  he 
would  have  been  a  great  man,  a  blessing  to  the  world. 
But  after  all,"  she  added,  "  I  ought  not  to  judge  the 
children  harshly.  The  difference  between  the  bright  and 
the  dull  is  not  so  great  as  we  think.  I  suppose  these  chil- 
dren cling  to  some  pet  habit  which  dwarfs  their  powers, 
just  as  Robert  clung  to  his  flat-iron,  and  it  is  not  so  easy 
for  a  teacher  to  find  out  what  it  is  and  take  it  away." 

We  all  need  outside  help.  A  part  of  the  training  of 
our  will  is  to  put  ourselves  under  the  control  of  those  we 
know  will  insist  on  our  doing  right  when  we  have  not  the 
strength  do  it  ourselves.  We  ought  to  seek  out  the  peo- 
ple who  rouse  our  best  aspirations,  and  to  surround  our- 
selves with  those  objects  which  nourish  our  highest 
moods.  By  and  by  we  shall  learn  to  do  without  them  if 
we  must. 

And  there  is,  I  believe,  infinite  help  for  all  of  us.  If 
our  whole  soul  is  set  on  the  right,  we  shall  be  so  in  har- 
mony with  the  universe  that  everything  —  sorrow  as  well 
as  joy  —  will  help  us  to  do  right. 

Let  us  begin,  if  we  have  not  already  begim,  to  culti- 
vate our  will  so  that  we  shall  be  serene  in  the  midst  either 
of  happy  excitement  or  of  annoyance,  courageous  when  we 
see  a  hard  duty  before  us,  and  active  in  doing  our  duty. 


XVI. 

JUSTICE  AND  TRUTH. 

THE  best  girls  are  prone  to  be  unjust.  Indeed,  it  is 
hardly  too  much  to  say  that  injustice  is  the  beset- 
ting sin  of  the  majority  of  good  girls.  Girls  whose  as- 
pirations are  the  highest,  whose  wills  are  so  disciplined 
that  they  do  not  hesitate  a  moment  before  any  hard 
duty,  who  are  full  of  love  to  God  and  man,  fail  here. 
This  is  partly  because  their  feelings  are  strong,  and 
mislead  them ;  but  I  believe  the  great  difficulty  is  that 
they  have  not  learned  to  think. 

The  mental  training  that  forms  the  judgment  is  thus 
of  direct  moral  value.  I  have  no  doubt  that  every  one 
would  admit  that  a  thoroughly  educated  woman  is  usually 
a  just  woman,  and  a  warm-hearted  woman  who  has 
learned  how  to  be  just  is  the  very  flower  of  womanhood. 
A  girl  who  has  been  taught  accomplishments  merely, 
though  she  may  be  very  charming  and  lovable,  often 
lacks  the  deep  foundations  on  which  a  noble  characiber 
must  be  reared. 


1/2     CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

I  have  already  given  a  chapter  to  the  intellectual  side 
of  the  question,  and  have  suggested  some  of  the  means 
of  learning  to  think. 

Now  one  great  reason  why  we  must  learn  to  think  is 
that  we  may  be  just.  A  girl  may  wonder  what  good  it 
can  do  her  to  detect  a  fallacy  in  geometry,  or  to  make  a 
correct  translation  of  a  Latin  poem,  or  to  weigh  the  evi- 
dence for  and  against  a  scientific  theory  or  a  historical 
fact ;  but  every  exercise  of  this  kind  helps  to  form  such 
a  habit  of  just  thought  that  it  will  probably  become 
harder  and  harder  for  her  to  join  in  careless  gossip  about 
an  acquaintance.  She  will  not  be  likely  to  condemn 
anybody  easily  on  hearsay,  but  will  always  wish  first  to 
hear  the  other  side. 

Fortunately  for  the  dull  girls,  who  find  geometry  and 
Latin  and  science  beyond  them,  these  are  not  the  only 
subjects  that  train  us  to  think  justly.  The  most  stupid 
girl  can  make  a  moral  stand  when  she  hears  a  bit  of 
scandal.  She  may  insist  on  suspending  her  judgment 
till  she  knows  the  tnith. 

To  think  justly  we  must  strive  to  know  the  whole 
truth  about  a  subject ;  to  act  justly  we  need  only  know 
that  part  of  the  tmth  which  would  influence  our  action. 

Mr.  Clapp,  the  Shakspeare  critic,  says  in  one  of  his 
inspiring  lectures  on  Macbeth  that  women  in  an  emer- 
gency shut  their  eyes  and  act,  refusing  to  see  the  tmth  ; 
while  men  keep  their  eyes  open,  but  set  their  teeth  and 


JUSTICE  AND  TRUTH.  173 

go  on.  Now,  if  we  shut  our  eyes  merely  because  we 
are  not  brave  enough  to  do  wrong  without  pretending  it 
is  right,  we  are  abject  creatures ;  but  if  we  shut  them 
because  we  are  determined  that  a  sight  of  the  danger 
shall  not  keep  us  from  doing  right,  we  hold  ourselves  to 
the  highest  justice.  Our  path,  perhaps,  is  a  narrow  one 
between  two  precipices.  We  know  there  is  a  terrible 
abyss  on  each  side.  But  there  is  no  mistake  about  the 
path.  Let  us  not  weaken  our  powers  by  looking  down  at 
the  horrors  below,  but  fix  our  eyes  on  the  sunlit  summit 
to  which  the  pathway  leads.  Many  a  girl  finds  her  lot  cast 
in  a  family  where  some  member  outrages  all  her  sense  of 
right.  She  fears  perhaps  even  more  than  she  knows. 
It  would  seldom  be  her  duty  to  watch  for  facts  to 
confirm  her  suspicions.  Let  her  believe  the  best  she 
possibly  can  about  the  wayward  one,  and  love  and  cher- 
ish and  honour  all  the  good  she  sees,  and  if  she  is  not 
self-righteous,  she  will  be  pretty  sure  to  find  a  great 
deal  of  good  even  in  one  she  must  often  condemn. 
Judgment  here  is  not  her  duty.  The  only  care  she 
need  have  is  not  to  lower  her  own  standard.  She  has 
her  own  good  life  to  lead,  and  it  will  not  help  her  to 
think  about  the  faults  of  anybody  else.  Moreover  the 
less  she  thinks  about  these,  the  more  likely  she  will  be 
to  help  in  amending  them. 

Take   these  lines  of  Mrs.  Browning  to  illustrate  my 
meaning :  — 


174     CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

"  She  never  found  fault  with  you,  never  implied 
Your  wrong  by  her  right ;  and  yet  n\en  at  her  side 
Grew  nobler,  girls  purer,  as  through  the  whole  town 
The  children  were  gladder  that  pulled  at  her  gown. 

My  Kate!" 

The  mother  of  a  family,  however,  must  be  willing  to 
open  her  eyes  to  the  faults  of  her  children,  because  the 
knowledge  will  influence  her  in  training  them. 

Or  suppose  a  girl  has  to  decide  the  question  of  mar- 
riage. It  will  not  do  for  her  to  ignore  her  lover's  faults. 
Suppose  she  suspects  he  drinks,  or  is  dishonest  in  busi- 
ness, or  leads  an  impure  life,  she  would  do  very  wrong 
to  marry  him  without  satisfying  herself  on  these  points. 
Even  if  she  decides  to  marry  him  after  her  eyes  are 
open,  her  attitude  toward  him  must  always  be  different 
in  consequence  of  her  knowledge.  She  can  no  longer 
hope  that  the  two  can  develop  side  by  side ;  and  though 
her  deliberate  object  may  be  to  raise  her  husband  to  her 
own  level,  she  must  always  anxiously  guard  herself  from 
falling  to  his. 

I  hope  this  makes  my  meaning  clear  in  saying  that 
*'  to  act  justly  we  need  only  know  that  part  of  the 
truth  which  would  influence  our  action."  If  a  girl  fears 
that  her  father  drinks,  he  is  still  her  father,  to  be  treated 
with  all  the  love  and  honour  she  can  give  him  ;  but  if 
her  lover  drinks,  her  chances  of  saving  him  are  greater 
before  marriage  than  after.  Knowledge  in  this  case 
changes  her  duty. 


JUSTICE  AND  TRUTH.  175 

Justice  and  truth  are  two  sides  of  the  same  virtue.  I 
do  not  believe  that  any  of  my  readers  ever  intentionally 
tell  a  lie.  I  know  that  some  girls  do  so,  but  they  are  not 
the  girls  who  are  interested  in  self-culture.  Still,  most 
of  us  are  not  perfectly  truthful.  Let  us  not  deceive 
ourselves  by  thinking  that  we  are,  for  then  we  shall  never 
give  ourselves  the  chance  to  improve. 

We  have  different  temptations,  and  they  do  not  assail 
us  in  the  form  we  have  prepared  for ;  accordingly,  we 
yield  before  we  quite  know  what  we  are  doing.  Is  there 
one  among  us  all  who  does  not  blush  to  think  of  some- 
thing she  has  done  which  she  had  not  thought  it  possible 
for  her  to  do?  Even  those  of  us  who  have  reached 
middle  age  and  who  have  striven  all  our  lives  to  resist 
temptation  seldom  can  look  back  many  weeks  without 
feeling  ashamed  of  some  insincere  deed  or  word. 

I  once  knew  a  high-minded  girl  of  good  intellect  who 
was  too  ambitious.  Her  geometry  teacher  put  a  great 
strain  upon  her  pupils  by  giving  them  a  book  to  study 
which  contained  full  proofs  of  the  propositions,  but  for- 
bidding them  to  read  a  word  beyond  the  statements. 
It  required  special  care  to  look  at  the  figure  and  not  see 
something  more.  "  Oh,  dear,"  sighed  one  of  the  class, 
"  when  we  say  the  Lord's  prayer  in  concert  in  the  morn- 
ing, and  come  to  the  passage  <  Lead  us  not  into  temp- 
tation,' I  always  think  of  the  geometry  lesson."  Well, 
this  temptation  was  too  much  for  our  heroine.    She  could 


176     CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

not  always  prove  the  propositions  for  herself,  and  she 
could  not  bear  to  admit  that  she  could  not.  She  was 
a  truthful  girl,  but  after  working  herself  nervous  over  a 
difficult  theorem,  she  did  sometimes  let  her  eye  wander 
down  the  page  till  she  saw  some  enlightening  reference. 
She  tried  to  still  her  conscience  by  saying  to  herself  that 
she  did  not  really  read  the  proof.  So  she  won  honours  in 
her  examination  and  went  triumphantly  on  her  course.  But 
her  heart  was  sore.  Time  passed  on.  She  was  about  to 
graduate,  and  she  could  look  back  on  four  years  of  as 
fine  work  as  had  been  done  by  any  girl  in  school.  At 
last,  however,  she  could  bear  her  trouble  no  longer.  She 
went  to  her  teacher  and  told  the  whole  truth,  feeling  that 
if  she  were  publicly  expelled  from  the  class,  it  would  be 
better  than  to  live  with  her  fault  unacknowledged.  The 
punishment  given  her  was  that  in  the  stress  and  hurry  of 
commencement  preparations  she  was  obliged  to  take  a 
wholly  new  geometry  and  work  through  every  proposition 
in  it  for  herself.  To  get  the  time  for  this,  she  had  to 
relinquish  her  part  in  the  commencement  programme. 

I  think  such  a  confession  showed  strong  moral  power. 
I  tell  this  story  for  two  reasons,  —  to  suggest  that  he 
"  who  thinketh  he  standeth "  still  has  need  to  "  cake 
heed  lest  he  fall,"  and  that  when  we  clearly  admit  that 
we  have  done  wrong,  we  may  — 

"  rise  on  stepping  stones 
Of  [ourl  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 


JUSTICE  AND   TRUTH.  177 

If  ihis  young  school-girl  had  said  to  herself,  ''  I  did 
not  tell  a  lie,  I  never  do  tell  lies,  I  dare  say  other  girls 
in  the  class  looked  at  the  proofs,"  and  had  so  excused 
herself,  she  would  have  done  what  many  of  us  do ;  and 
by  refusing  to  own  that  there  was  a  blemish  on  the 
whiteness  of  her  beautiful  character,  she  would  have  be- 
come incapable  of  washing  away  the  stain.  She  might 
have  forgotten  her  fault  and  have  enjoyed  her  class  re- 
unions and  the  cordial  welcome  which  her  teachers  gave 
her  when  she  revisited  her  Alma  Mater;  but  who  would 
not  choose  the  suffering  for  the  sake  of  her  victory? 

I  think  all  ambitious  girls  have  a  kindred  temptation, 
though  I  do  not  mean  that  it  often  presents  itself  in  just 
this  form.  But  some  of  you  are  silently  aware,  if  you 
are  honest  with  yourselves,  that  you  like  to  appear  a 
little  wiser,  a  litde  more  learned,  than  you  really  are. 

We  all  conceal  our  defects  of  all  kinds  as  much  as 
we  can,  and  we  have  a  right  to  do  this.  It  would  be 
an  injury  to  others  as  well  as  ourselves  if  we  went 
about  proclaiming  our  shortcomings.  It  is  not  a  very 
good  plan  to  talk  much  about  ourselves  even  to  our 
dearest  friends.  But  there  is  a  faint  line  dividing  the 
reserve  of  self-control  which  leads  us  to  try  quietly  to 
correct  our  faults  instead  of  talking  about  them,  and 
the  reserve  we  practise  for  the  sake  of  making  others 
believe  we  are  better  than  we  are.  No  one  but  our- 
selves can  decide  where  this  line  lies ;  but  if  we  aspire 

12 


178      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

to  be  truthful,  we  must  take  heed  that  we  never  go  be- 
yond it. 

Another  temptation  to  untruthfulness  which  besets 
many  women  comes  from  the  desire  to  attract  others. 
This  is  strongest  in  some  of  the  loveliest  characters,  for 
a  gracious  woman  who  has  tact  can  so  easily  say  some- 
thing very  sweet,  yet  not  altogether  untrue,  which  flat- 
ters her  hearer,  and  reacts  in  making  the  speaker 
beloved  and  admired.  Tact  is  a  dangerous  gift.  Here, 
too,  the  dividing  line  between  right  and  wrong  is  very 
faint.  Bluntness  is  not  necessarily  truthful  any  more 
than  flattery  is.  Every  large-hearted,  loving  woman  does 
really  see  a  thousand  good  and  delightful  qualities  in 
those  about  her  which  the  careless  pass  by  unheeded. 
Her  deep  sympathy,  too,  often  shows  her  that  the  need 
for  recognition  is  very  real  to  many,  indeed  to  most  of 
us,  however  firmly  we  may  seem  to  stand  alone,  and  she 
longs  to  give  it. 

"  Hast  thou  .  .  . 
.  .  .  loved  so  well  a  high  behaviour 
In  man  or  maid  that  thou  from  speech  refrained  ^** 

Those  who  live  in  this  spirit  are  noble  men  and  women. 
I  often  think  of  the  words  of  a  friend,  "  The  best  people 
are  those  we  should  n't  be  wilHng  to  let  hear  us  praise 
them."  And  yet  most  of  us  cannot  be  our  best  without 
the  warm  nourishment  of  some  genuine  praise.  Now, 
when  the  time  comes  for  a  woman  —  or  a  girl  —  to  speak 


JUSTICE  AND  TRUTH.  179 

an  appreciative  word  to  one  in  need,  how  shall  she  be 
sure  to  say  just  enough  and  not  too  much?  For  one 
thing,  she  must  be  careful  to  tell  the  truth;  and  for 
another  thing,  she  must  keep  her  own  longing  for  an 
appreciative  word  in  return  sternly  in  the  background. 
Love  begets  love  and  appreciation  appreciation  ;  but  any- 
thing like  a  mutual  admiration  society  is  nauseating,  and 
any  interview  which  seems  likely  to  end  in  that  way  must 
come  to  a  peremptory  close. 

Sometimes  our  heart  so  overflows  with  love  and  admir- 
ation of  another  that  we  cannot  help  speaking.  It  is  not 
that  the  one  to  whom  we  speak  needs  our  words,  but  that 
our  gratitude  for  the  blessing  which  comes  to  us  out  of 
the  fulness  of  the  life  of  our  friend  must  have  reUef  in 
expression.  It  is  right  for  us  to  speak.  But  how  doubly 
wrong  it  would  be  for  us  ever  to  simulate  such  a  feeling  ! 
How  wrong  to  exaggerate  the  germs  of  such  a  feeling  ! 

In  questions  of  truth,  there  is  danger  of  losing  sight 
of  moral  perspective,  to  use  a  phrase  of  Dr.  James 
Freeman  Clarke.  I  remember  a  young  lady  who  was  so 
morbidly  conscientious  in  the  matter  of  speaking  the 
truth  that  one  night  when  a  sick  friend  with  whom  she 
was  watching  asked  her  what  time  it  was,  she  could  not 
be  contented  till  she  had  consulted  several  clocks,  as  well 
as  her  own  watch,  which  she  feared  was  not  quite  right, 
and  then  she  said  hesitatingly,  "It  is  about  five  — no. 


l80     CHATS   WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

six  —  minutes  past  twelve!"  Of  course  she  wearied 
and  annoyed  the  invaUd,  and  though  she  was  a  truthful 
young  lady,  I  do  not  think  she  was  necessarily  thoroughly 
truthful  in  feeling  and  action.  I  believe  the  chances  are 
against  her.  No  one  can  distort  the  conscience  like  that 
and  still  keep  the  balance  which  perfect  justice  requires. 
It  is  not  the  girls  who  exaggerate  absurdly  in  their 
picturesque  conversation  who  really  misrepresent  the 
truth,  but  those  who  lay  on  just  enough  of  the  false 
colouring  to  make  us  suppose  that  the  colours  are  true. 
When  Sam  Weller  talks  about "  double  million  magnifying 
glasses  of  hextra  power,"  we  do  not  feel  any  need  of  cor- 
recting his  language  in  the  interests  of  truth,  even  though 
we  may  hold  the  opinion  that  hyperbole  is  a  figure  of 
speech  which  must  enter  sparingly  into  elegant  diction." 

Perhaps  I  have  said  too  much  of  our  temptations  to 
falsehood  and  not  much  to  help  a  girl  to  cultivate  truth- 
fulness. Of  course  it  is  first  necessary  to  understand  our 
aim,  and  then  if  our  will  is  disciplined,  we  shall  be  able 
to  move  steadily  in  the  right  direction.  But  I  will  make 
one  or  two  suggestions.  First,  let  us  avoid  temptation 
as  far  as  we  can.  If  a  girl  is  tempted  to  look  into  her 
book  while  reciting  a  lesson,  she  must  leave  it  in  her 
desk.  If  she  knows  that  her  kind  words  to  her  friends 
are  usually  overkind  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to  avoid  all 
personal  conversation  for  a  while. 


JUSTICE  AND  TRUTH.  l8l 

Second,  we  can  often  help  others  in  a  negative  way  by 
avoiding  embarrassing  questions.  All  of  us  have  affairs 
and  even  opinions  which  we  have  a  perfect  right  to  con- 
ceal; but  if  anybody  asks  us  a  direct  question  about 
them,  we  are  often  in  a  cruel  dilemma.  We  cannot  tell 
a  lie,  and  we  cannot  tell  the  truth.  If  we  show  any 
hesitation  or  say  boldly  that  we  do  not  wish  to  answer, 
that  is  often  in  itself  a  complete  answer.  A  truthful 
woman  — that  is  one  who  is  truthful  all  the  way  through 
—  loves  truth  in  others  as  well  as  in  herself,  and  she  can 
often  give  efficient  aid  to  her  friends  by  abstaining  from 
a  question  she  wishes  to  ask.  If  it  is  about  some  deli- 
cate matter  which  she  thinks  her  friend  wishes  encour- 
agement to  confide  to  her  she  can  easily  make  it  clear 
that  she  would  be  glad  of  the  confidence  without  putting 
a  direct  question. 

These  suggestions  are  slight;  but  the  girls  who  are 
determined  to  be  thoroughly  truthful  will  have  no  diffi- 
culty in  making  others  for  themselves,  and  each  one 
probably  knows  her  own  needs  best. 


XVII. 

A  SPIRIT  OF   LOVE. 

NOTHING  is  so  great  as  love.  We  must  have  a 
loving  spirit.  But  how  can  we  make  ourselves  love 
anybody ;  and  who  cares  for  forced  love  ?  I  cannot  give 
much  help  here,  but  if  I  withheld  the  little  I  can  give, 
I  should  feel  that  the  rest  of  my  words  were  as  sounding 
brass  and  a  tinkling  cymbal. 

**  Mamma  says  I  must  be  sincere,"  said  a  fine  young 
girl,  "  and  when  I  ask  her  whether  I  shall  say  to  certain 
people,  *  Good-morning,  I  am  not  very  glad  to  see  you,' 
she  says,  '  My  dear,  you  must  be  glad  to  see  them,  and 
then  there  will  be  no  trouble.'  " 

One  thing  is  sure.  We  must  realize  that  the  spirit  of 
love  is  essential  to  us,  or  we  shall  spend  our  strength  on 
things  not  essential.  I  once  knew  a  child  who  had  no 
mark  for  absence  or  tardiness  during  a  whole  year  at 
school.  The  energy  and  perseverance  she  showed  in 
earning  such  a  record  are  praiseworthy.  But  there  was 
one  day  in  the  year  when  her  brother  was  to  set  out  on 
a  long  and  dangerous  journey.     There  was  reason  to 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  1 83 

think  he  might  never  come  back.  The  child  was  full  of 
grief  at  the  parting,  and  yet  she  believed  she  ought  to 
give  up  the  last  precious  hours  with  him  and  go  to  school. 
It  was  heroic,  but  did  she  not  put  a  false  emphasis  on 
punctuality  ?  She  did  not  understand  that  love  is  greater 
than  punctuality.  Every  other  day  in  the  year  she  had 
been  right,  but  this  day  I  believe  she  was  wrong. 

When  we  once  realize  the  need  of  a  loving  heart,  what 
can  we  do  to  nourish  it  ?  At  least  we  must  learn  to  be 
unselfish.  As  long  as  we  think  of  ourselves  and  act  for 
ourselves,  love  cannot  have  a  luxuriant  growth  in  us. 
Unselfishness  is  the  key  to  this  whole  subject,  and  we 
learn  it  not  from  books,  but  by  living. 

I  remember  a  young  lady  who  died  long  ago  whose 
heart  seemed  to  overflow  with  love  to  everybody  in  the 
world.  Yet  she  had  two  or  three  strong  antipathies ;  she 
did  not  indulge  herself  in  these,  but  set  herself  at  work 
to  overcome  them.  She  was  a  teacher,  and  among  her 
scholars  was  a  young  girl  so  wanting  in  tact  that  she  made 
herself  disagreeable  to  everybody.  The  teacher  owned 
that  she  could  hardly  bear  to  speak  to  her  even  in  the 
class ;  but  when  she  had  owned  it,  she  became  aware 
that  she  was  wrong,  and  she  determined  to  change  her 
feeling.  She  began  by  making  a  distinct  effort  every  day 
to  do  some  kindness  to  her  pupil.  She  would  not  shrink 
from  her  any  longer,  but  took  special  pains  to  meet  her 
and  talk  with  her.     Much  sooner  than  she  had  expected 


1 84      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF- CULTURE. 

she  found  herself  really  caring  for  her  protegee.  The 
girl  had  many  good  traits,  though  they  did  not  appear  on 
the  surface ;  but  as  soon  as  the  teacher  began  to  know 
her,  they  were  evident.  Of  course  the  pupil  became 
more  passionately  attached  to  her  teacher  than  to  any 
one  else  in  the  world,  so  that  as  a  reward  of  her  kindness 
the  teacher  was  forced  to  be  more  kind,  for  the  pupil 
followed  her  footsteps  everywhere.  Yet  the  teacher  did 
not  flinch.  She  even  took  the  girl's  cold,  clammy  hand 
— which  she  had  once  said,  with  a  shudder,  made  her  feel 
as  if  she  had  grasped  a  fish  —  in  her  own  warm  one, 
and  seemed  glad  to  give  something  of  her  own  vitality  to 
the  forlorn  young  creature. 

I  do  not  know  whether  such  a  victory  would  be  possi- 
ble to  all  of  us  even  if  we  had  the  courage  and  patience 
to  fight  with  our  prejudices  so  bravely.  This  teacher 
was  deeply  religious.  She  had  a  positive  beHef  in  the 
power  of  God  to  lift  us  above  ourselves,  and  she  defi- 
nitely prayed  for  help  in  her  struggle.  She  did  really 
win,  for  she  truly  loved  the  girl  who  had  so  repelled  her. 

This  is  the  strongest  case  of  the  kind  that  ever  came 
to  my  personal  knowledge.  I  think  most  of  us  are  con- 
tented to  drift  along  with  our  i)rcjudices,  and  that  we 
hardly  try  to  conquer  them.  But  if  we  could  once  be 
roused  to  believe  that  we  ought  to  fight  this  battle  and 
that  we  must  win  it,  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  we 
could.     There  is  — 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  l8S 

"  The  possible  angel  that  underlies 
The  passing  phase  of  the  meanest  thing." 

It  is  probably  true  that  everybody  has  some  good  and 
lovable  traits  of  character.  At  all  events  did  any  one 
ever  sincerely  try  to  find  something  good  in  another 
without  succeeding?  It  is  the  ** possible  angel"  we 
must  look  for,  and  there  is  probably  no  way  of  finding 
it  so  quickly  as  by  active  kindness. 

We  need  also  to  be  kind  in  word  and  thought.  All 
gossip  about  others'  faults  is  unprofitable.  Among  the 
ignorant,  it  shows  a  vacant  mind.  There  is  even  a  worse 
form  of  it  among  the  intellectual,  —  that  of  saying  witty 
things  of  the  foibles  of  our  neighbors.  Everybody  has 
faults;  but  it  is  seldom  indeed  that  it  is  necessary  to 
mention  them,  and  it  would  be  humiHating  if  we  had 
nothing  better  to  think  about.  The  habit  of  saying  and 
thinking  the  best  that  is  true  of  all  our  acquaintances 
would  change  our  attitude  toward  the  world.  Who  of 
us  does  not  fail  here? 

But  who  cares  to  be  loved  from  a  sense  of  duty?  It 
is  very  well  to  try  to  love  other  people,  but  do  we  want 
them  to  try  to  love  us  ?  If  we  resent  that,  it  is  all  the 
more  necessary  for  us  to  be  so  lovable  that  nobody  can 
help  loving  us. 

What  is  it  to  be  lovable  ? 

I  know  a  handsome,  healthy  boy  who  plays  foot-ball 
with  a  will,  swims  like  a  fish,  and  rides  like  an  Indian.    I 


1 86      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

have  never  known  him  to  come  into  a  room  which  he 
did  not  brighten  by  his  presence.  His  radiant  smile 
seems  to  kindle  an  answering  flash  on  every  countenance. 
His  clear  laugh  puts  everybody  in  good  spirits ;  he  likes 
to  do  kind  acts ;  he  is  always  preparing  some  delightful 
surprise  for  somebody ;  he  is  at  leisure  when  his  mother 
wants  an  errand  done,  and  thinks  it  only  fun  to  run  a 
mile  for  a  spool  of  thread ;  he  is  absolutely  without 
self-consciousness ;  he  is  lovable,  and  everybody  adores 
him.  Here  health  and  vigour  supplement  an  unselfish 
heart.  The  moral  I  draw  from  him  is  that  if  we  wish  to 
be  lovable,  we  should  first  be  unselfish,  and  second,  do 
our  best  to  be  well.  We  shall  not  all  succeed  in  being 
as  charming  as  he  is ;  but  we  may  have  a  degree  of  suc- 
cess, and  at  least  we  shall  make  others  happier,  whether 
we  win  their  regard  or  not. 

I  know  a  lovable  young  girl  who  is  very  poor.  She  is 
upright  and  industrious  and  sensitive ;  but  she  is  also  so 
loving  and  grateful  that  everj'body  likes  to  help  her. 
The  most  commonplace  kindness  makes  her  beam  with 
delight.  She  loves  everybody  and  thinks  everybody  is  ac- 
tuated by  the  noblest  motives.  She  wishes  she  could  help 
others.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  she  always  gives  more  than 
she  receives,  though  her  gifts  are  intangible,  and  neither 
she  nor  her  friends  recognize  them  as  gifts.  But  she 
clears  the  atmosphere  wherever  she  goes.  Haughty 
young  women  who  snub  half  their  associates  unbend  to 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  1 8/ 

her.  It  is  so  impossible  for  her  to  conceive  that  any 
one  can  be  capable  of  snubbing  her,  that  she  gives  a 
warm  greeting  to  these  stately  belles,  and  they  thaw  be- 
fore they  have  time  to  remember  their  dignity.  I  do 
not  mean  that  she  ever  forces  herself  upon  anybody.  She 
is  peculiarly  thoughtful  in  such  ways ;  but  when  she  does 
meet  any  one,  her  instincts  are  so  generous  and  noble 
that  she  does  not  stop  for  the  moment  of  suspicion 
which  wrecks  so  many  good  but  self-conscious  girls,  be- 
fore her  glorious  smile  shines  out  and  her  eager  voice 
speaks  a  welcome.  If  she  had  a  million  dollars  she 
would  greet  a  poor  girl  in  that  way,  and  she  simply  can- 
not conceive  that  all  the  girls  who  have  a  million  do  not 
feel  as  she  does. 

The  vitality  of  her  temperament  no  doubt  adds  to  her 
charm.  If  her  blood  were  more  sluggish,  she  might 
pause  for  the  one  fatal  moment,  and  after  she  had  seen 
the  cool  face  before  her  clearly  it  would  be  too  late  to 
smile.  And  yet  these  proud  young  girls  who  are  contri- 
buting to  her  education  (and  feel  themselves  much 
puffed  up  by  their  charitable  deeds)  love  the  sweetness 
of  that  smile,  and  go  away  glowing  with  the  sense  of  their 
own  graciousness.  They  are  glad  that  she  makes  them  so 
gracious,  and  they  love  her.  Well,  we  cannot  make  our 
own  temperament;  but  if  we  sometimes  remembered 
what  it  is  to  be  lovable,  we  might  occasionally  find  out 
the  way.     If  we  cannot  do  this,  we  must  not  resent  the 


1 88      CHATS  WITH   GH<LS  ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

endeavours  of  other  people  to  love  us  from  a  sense  of 
duty.  But  need  we  resent  them  ?  Do  we  not  really 
wish  that  others  would  look  for  the  good  in  us  instead  of 
magnifying  the  bad?  After  all,  I  do  not  believe  we  are 
likely  to  quarrel  with  any  one  who  tries  to  cultivate  the 
spirit  of  love,  even  if  the  effort  has  to  be  directed  toward 
ourselves.  We  should  object  no  doubt  to  any  conde- 
scension ;  but  those  who  are  sincerely  trying  to  be  large- 
hearted  have  not  much  time  to  think  of  their  own 
superiority,  and  so  they  cannot  condescend. 

At  all  events,  we  can  love  others,  and  that  is  even 
better  than  to  be  loved  by  them,  though  we  do  not  be- 
lieve it.  Even  in  the  case  of  the  love  between  men  and 
women,  the  same  thing  is  tme,  though  it  is  not  my 
duty  to  speak  of  it.  There  is  nothing  finer  in  all 
George  Eliot's  novels  than  what  she  says  of  Will  Ladis- 
law's  love  for  Dorothea.  His  supreme  happiness  came 
from  the  perception  that  here  was  a  creature  worthy 
of  being  perfectly  loved.  I  think  if  girls  always  kept 
that  standard  of  love  before  them,  there  would  be  fewer 
silly  love-affairs,  and  fewer  miserable  marriages.  Per- 
haps there  would  be  fewer  marriages  of  any  kind,  but 
those  that  did  take  place  would  bring  a  deej^er  happiness. 

Do  we  love  even  those  we  love  best  with  full  measure  ? 
We  depend  on  them,  and  enjoy  them,  and  cannot  endure 
their  loss ;  but  all  that  may  fall  short  of  love.  It  is  pos- 
sible to  cling  very  closely  to  our  friend  in  a  weak  and 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  1 89 

selfish  way.     It  is  an  overfiowing  heart  which  gives  as 
freely  as  it  takes. 

Can  we  not  enter  more  completely  into  the  lives  of 
those  dear  to  us?  Can  we  not  prune  our  own  selfish 
fancies  so  that  instead  of  demanding  everything  from  our 
friends,  we  may  give  without  stint  to  them? 

There  is  a  peril  in  an  intellectual  life.  It  is  easy  to  be 
so  absorbed  in  study  that  we  forget  to  live.  Educated 
women  are  more  just  than  the  ignorant,  and,  on  the 
whole,  they  love  quite  as  well,  though  more  wisely.  In- 
deed, I  remember  once  hearing  a  thoughtful  woman  say, 
"  I  have  noticed  that  none  of  the  intellectual  women  I 
know  are  as  famous  as  they  promised  to  be,  and  the 
reason  is  that  they  always  sacrifice  their  intellect  to  their 

family." 

In  spite  of  this  verdict,  some  of  us  must  be  conscious 
that  even  when  we  are  ready  to  make  sacrifices  on  a 
large  scale,  we  do  allow  ourselves  to  be  so  occupied  with 
books  and  thought  that  we  have  no  space  to  expand  with 
a  warm,  fresh  life,  which  would  be  a  far  greater  blessing 
to  our  friends  than  many  of  our  weary  sacrifices.  We 
easily  wear  out  in  the  search  for  knowledge,  and  even  in 
trying  to  do  our  duty  our  strength  fails  us ;  but  there  is 
a  quickening  principle  in  love  which  restores  our  powers. 

It  takes  time  to  love.  It  is  true  that  love  is  not 
bounded  by  time.  Our  hearts  may  be  swelling  with  love 
while  we  are  doing  the  most  trivial  things.     The  little 


igO     CHATS  WITH  GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

girl,  to  whom  time  seems  unlimited,  who  begs  to  make  a 
pudding  to  surprise  papa  at  dinner,  is  alive  with  love  to 
her  very  finger-tips  even  while  she  is  beating  the  eggs 
and  mixing  the  butter  and  sugar ;  and  the  young  lady 
who  is  taking  lessons  at  the  cooking-school  to  fit  herself 
to  add  comfort  to  the  life  of  the  young  man  she  has  just 
become  engaged  to,  will  work  over  her  recipes  with  an 
ardour  which  transfigures  them  to  poems.  No  doubt 
there  is  many  an  overburdened  mother,  who  has  not  a 
minute  to  herself  from  sunrise  to  sunset,  whose  drudgery 
is  happiness,  because  it  is  a  means  of  expression  of  the 
love  within  her  for  those  who  are  to  wear  the  clothes  she 
makes  and  to  live  in  the  rooms  she  sweeps.  Whenever 
we  are  doing  mechanical  work,  even  when  it  is  not  done 
for  those  we  love,  our  thoughts  are  free,  and  we  may 
give  them  to  our  friends,  though  it  is  not  true  that  all 
hand-workers  do  thus  employ  themselves.  But  with  in- 
tellectual work  it  is  different.  To  study,  we  must  not 
only  be  alone  and  silent,  but  we  must  be  absorbed  in 
what  we  are  doing.  Even  if  the  aim  of  our  work  is 
the  good  of  others,  we  cannot  think  of  them  while  we 
are  doing  it ;  and  if  we  work  hard,  we  become  more  and 
more  involved  in  our  studies  and  perhaps  less  and  less 
able  to  shake  off  their  yoke. 

There  was  once  a  woman  who  had  occasion  to  sup- 
port several  invalid  relatives.  She  loved  them,  but  their 
personal  care  did  not  fall  upon  her.     She  could  however 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  IQ^ 

earn  a  large  salary  as  a  teacher,  and  she  cheerfully  de- 
voted this  to  their  needs.     But  she  could  not  hold  her 
fine  position  without  arduous  study.     Every  moment  was 
crowded.     One  day  she  was  on  her  way  to  take  a  lesson 
from  a  distinguished  professor  when  a  dirty  little  boy 
begged  for  some  money  to  buy  food.     She  shook  her 
head  hastily  and  hurried  on.    There  were  several  reasons 
for  doing  this :  the  authorities  of  the  city  had  earnestly 
requested  that  no  alms  should  be  given  on  the  street ; 
she  was  in  a  great  hurry,  and  it  would  have  delayed  her 
to  investigate  the  story  and  see  that  the  child  was  placed 
under   proper  care ;   and  her  purse  was  almost  empty. 
When  she  had  gone  about  a  block  farther,  she  suddenly 
stopped.     It  flashed  across  her  mind  that  the  boy  might 
really  be  suffering ;  that  it  might  have  been  in  her  power 
not  only  to  help  him  at  the  moment,  but  to  find  out 
something  about  him,  and  so  place  him  where  his  whole 
life  might  be  the  better  in  consequence.     She  knew  how 
improbable  all  this  was,  still  it  was  possible,  and  she  felt 
that  the  responsibility  was  hers.     She  looked  back,  but 
the  boy  had  disappeared.     She  thought  that  she  ought 
not  to  have  refused  such  an  appeal  from  a  child  mechani- 
cally.    If  he  were  an  impostor  at  that  age,  it  was  all  the 
more  necessary  that  some  one  should  look  after  him ; 
if  not,  poor  as   she  was,  she  could  spare  a   few  cents 
for  him.     Her  time  was  more  precious  even  than  her 
money ;  but  she  could  have  stopped  five  minutes,  and 


192      CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

if  she  had  still  been  in  doubt  as  to  his  truthfulness, 
she  could  have  bought  some  rolls  for  him  and  superin- 
tended his  eating  them.  She  bitterly  regretted  that 
absorption  in  her  own  thoughts  had  led  her  to  form 
the  habit  of  doing  mechanically  what  she  should  have 
done  intelligently,  though  the  pressure  in  her  life  came 
almost  wholly  from  her  acknowledgment  of  the  claims 
of  others. 

She  told  me  that  she  had  little  fear  for  the  boy.  She 
thought  she  should  have  refused  the  money  in  the  end ; 
but  she  could  not  get  over  the  shock  of  finding  that 
callous  spot  in  her  character. 

When  we  are  absorbed  in  thought  petty  interruptions 
are  almost  unendurable,  and  none  of  us  can  be  too  care- 
ful not  to  disturb  others  in  this  way ;  but  every  time  we 
suffer  ourselves  to  give  way  to  irritation  when  we  are 
interrupted,  it  is  an  admission  that  thought  is  more  to  us 
than  life,  and  that  intellect  is  more  than  love.  I  do  not 
mean,  of  course,  that  we  should  allow  many  interruptions 
from  children  and  others  whom  it  is  our  duty  to  train  in 
habits  of  thoughtfulness  ;  but  that  where  we  have  no  such 
duty  or  right,  there  can  hardly  be  better  discipline  for 
us  than  the  constant  remembrance  that  nothing  we  are 
trying  to  learn  can  be  worth  quite  so  much  as  the  power 
to  enter  sweetly  into  the  little  needs  and  wishes  of 
others. 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  193 

The  distribution  of  our  time  has  a  more  far-reaching 
influence  in  cultivating  the  spirit  of  love  than  we  at  first 
think.  No  one  who  is  free  to  choose  should  plan  to  fill 
the  whole  day  with  rigid  occupations.  There  are  few 
who  can  afford  five  hours  of  solid  study.  Yet  some  are 
so  placed  that  they  usually  have  that  time  to  spare,  and 
they  may  fall  into  the  habit  of  employing  it  in  study.  In 
such  a  case,  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to  arrange  regular 
work  for  four  hours,  and  then  lay  aside  some  interesting 
book  that  could  be  snatched  up  at  odd  moments  to  be 
read  in  the  remaining  hour.  Then  if  a  whole  hour 
should  be  wasted  in  interruptions,  the  main  work  of  each 
day  would  go  on  easily.  So,  if  we  usually  have  an  hour 
to  study  we  may  make  the  last  quarter  of  it  elastic. 

We  want  plenty  of  time  for  the  larger  interruptions  of 
life,  to  have  real  conversation  with  our  real  friends  as 
well  as  a  pleasant  word  for  a  new  acquaintance,  to  write 
letters  that  tell  something  of  what  we  are  thinking  to 
those  we  used  to  love  but  who  are  drifting  away  from 
us  because  life  presses  so  on  all  sides.  Those  who  can 
choose  must  never  let  their  friends  go  even  when  the 
margin  of  choice  is  narrow.  A  woman  who  earns  her 
living  has  a  struggle  to  decide  whether  she  will  give  her 
litde  leisure  to  study  or  to  her  friends.  If  some  of 
her  friends  will  study  with  her,  it  may  be  the  solution 
of  the  question,  though  the  best  study  requires  silence 
and  solitude ;  and  she  need  not  make  many  new  friends. 

13 


194      CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

But  if  she  takes  all  her  leisure  for  study  her  heart  will 
wither  within  her. 

When  I  say  that  we  must  be  generous  in  giving  our 
time  to  others  if  we  ever  hope  that  love  in  us  may  grow 
to  be  a  vigorous  plant,  I  do  not  mean  that  we  should 
give  time  to  gossip.  I  know  sisters  and  friends  who 
spend  most  of  their  time  together  in  reading  aloud  to 
save  themselves  from  talking  over  other  people  ad  nau- 
seam. It  is  as  bad  to  give  too  much  time  to  our  friends 
as  too  little.  Interchange  of  thought  and  experience 
and  life  is  good ;  but  when  the  conversation  begins  to 
grow  weak,  it  is  time  for  silence,  and  perhaps  it  is  time 
to  be  alone.  In  the  distribution  of  time,  one  reason 
that  we  must  give  a  part  of  it  to  mental  culture  is  that 
we  may  have  something  to  say  worth  saying  when  the 
time  comes  to  speak. 

There  can  never  be  fine  culture  of  any  kind  while  we 
are  in  a  hurry.  We  have  a  right  to  be  busy  —  indeed  if 
we  are  strong  and  well,  every  moment  of  our  day  may 
be  filled  to  the  brim ;  but  for  that  very  reason,  because 
we  wish  to  enjoy  the  full  richness  of  every  moment,  we 
cannot  afford  to  hurry  over  it  to  the  next. 

Quiet  and  leisure  to  think  over  and  enjoy  our  books,  our 
music,  and  our  pictures  is  necessary  before  they  really  be- 
come part  of  ourselves.  Unless  our  culture  is  thoroughly 
assimilated,  it  is  not  culture  at  all.     It  is  a  good  thing  to 


A  SPIRIT  OF  LOVE.  I95 

look  at  the  sky  once  a  day  if  we  can  do  no  more,  but 
we  want  whole  days  in  the  open  air,  when  we  feel  — 

"  Oh,  what  have  I  to  do  with  time  ? 
For  this  the  day  was  made." 

But  hurry  soils  the  heart  even  more  than  the  intellect. 
We  may  win  a  fact  for  use  even  when  pushing  along  post- 
haste ;  but  if  we  love  our  friends,  we  must  be  wilhng  to 
linger  over  the  thought  of  them,  and  we  certainly  ought 
not  to  be  too  busy  to  be  glad  to  see  them. 

Sympathy  is  an  essential  part  of  love.  I  have  long 
thought  that  true  sympathy  was  an  intellectual  quality. 
The  very  best  of  sympathy  is  perhaps  independent  of 
the  intellect,  for  a  child  or  even  an  animal  may  show 
that  it  suffers  with  you,  simply  because  it  loves  you.  But 
while  we  welcome  the  sympathy  of  a  child  who  cannot 
understand  our  trouble,  most  of  us  are  irritated  by  the 
incompetent  pity  of  older  people  who  ought  to  compre- 
hend our  position,  but  who  get  no  further  than  to  be 
sorry  for  our  suffering  whether  we  are  right  or  wrong.  I 
know  that  some  of  the  most  sympathetic  people  are  far 
from  being  learned,  —  indeed  there  is  always  danger 
that  learning  will  choke  the  growth  of  sympathy;  but 
it  is  by  using  the  powers  of  thought,  memory,  and  imagi- 
nation in  entering  into  the  trials  and  problems  of  other 
people  that  we  are  finally  able  to  put  ourselves  in  their 
places  and  feel  intelligently  for  them.    Then,  as  we  are 


196      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

not  blinded  by  personal  feeling,  we  may  often  see  the 
right  course  more  clearly  than  our  suffering  friend,  and 
be  able  to  give  the  wise  and  firm  support  needed  at  this 
crisis. 

Intellectual  sympathy  with  all  about  her,  it  seems  to 
me,  is  one  of  the  highest  aims  a  girl  who  desires  self- 
culture  can  set  before  herself.  Here  is  a  worthy  object 
to  occupy  the  strongest  mind.  It  is  when  an  intellectual 
girl  spends  herself  on  lower  studies  altogether  that  she 
becomes  a  pedant. 

Sympathy  with  all  about  her,  I  have  said.  Can  we 
love  everybody?  Do  we  not  weaken  ourselves  in  the 
attempt  to  love  everybody  ?  Can  there  be  any  enthusi- 
asm in  love  that  is  divided  among  so  many  people  ?  Can 
we  love  anybody  very  rapturously  when  we  love  so  many? 
In  answer,  I  will  say  that  among  the  women  I  know  — 
and  I  dare  say  the  same  is  true  of  men  —  those  who 
have  shown  the  most  intense  love  for  a  few  friends  are 
also  those  who  have  given  the  largest  measure  of  gener- 
ous affection  to  everybody  they  have  come  in  contact 
with,  from  the  servant  in  the  kitchen  to  the  fellow-trav- 
eller of  a  day  whom  they  are  never  to  see  again. 

Dante  tells  us  again  and  again  that  love  is  the  one 
thing  that  is  inexhaustible.  The  more  we  love  the  more 
we  can  love.  The  more  that  we  are  loved,  the  more  we 
can  love  in  return,  for  "  he  that  loveth  is  born  of  God," 
and  has  a  part  in  what  is  infinite. 


XVIII. 

THE   CHOICE   OF   COMPANIONS. 

IT  is  fatal  to  growth  to  confine  ourselves  to  one  set 
of  companions,  even  if  they  are  good  and  intellect- 
ual and  refined.  The  world  is  large,  and  no  one  circle 
absorbs  all  the  goodness  and  intellect  and  refinement 
within  the  reach  of  its  members,  if  they  are  only  willing 
to  step  sometimes  beyond  its  boundary.  A  new  stand- 
point shows  us  new  virtues  even  in  our  particular 
friends.  But  the  worst  effect  of  exclusiveness  is  that  at 
last  we  come  to  believe  that  our  centre  is  the  centre 
of  the  universe.  The  exclusive  spirit  does  not  belong 
to  aristocrats  alone,  I  wonder  if  there  is  one  among 
us  so  free  from  it  as  to  be  qualified  to  cast  the  first 
stone.  The  Boston  servants  who  cannot  think  of  taking 
a  situation  except  on  the  Back  Bay  usually  require  more 
credentials  from  a  new  acquaintance  than  their  mis- 
tresses  do.  We  all  know  plenty  of  religious  people  who 
will  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  worldly,  plenty  of  in- 
tellectual people  who  take  pride  in  avoiding  society,  and 
farmers  who  look  down  upon  the  city  boarders  quite  as 
much  as  the  city  boarders  look  down  upon  them. 


198     CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

Nevertheless,  the  choice  of  our  companions  has  an 
overwhelming  effect  on  our  culture,  and  especially  with 
those  of  us  who  are  more  influenced  by  persons  than 
by  books. 

For  instance,  none  of  us  can  afford  to  mingle  with 
coarse  people  until  our  own  refinement  is  assured. 
When  we  reach  that  point,  the  coarseness  will  repel 
us;  but  we  may  be  able  to  see  good  and  attractive 
traits  in  coarse  people,  and  while  our  superior  refine- 
ment may  help  them,  their  goodness  may  help  us  still 
more. 

With  little  children,  it  is  right  to  take  great  care  that 
they  should  have  only  the  best  companions.  Until 
they  have  judgment  enough  to  decide  what  is  good  and 
what  is  bad  in  those  about  them,  it  is  dangerous  for 
them  to  come  in  contact  with  the  bad  at  all;  though 
on  the  other  hand,  if  they  are  kept  entirely  apart  from 
others,  they  can  hardly  be  saved  from  selfishness,  —  which 
is  worse  than  the  vices  they  escape.  A  mother  often 
has  to  choose  between  two  evils  for  her  child ;  but  at 
least  she  should  always  make  sure  that  its  care  is  given 
only  to  a  good  and  trustworthy  person. 

When  a  girl  is  old  enough  to  choose  her  own  friends, 

how  shall  she  choose  ?     She  is  generally  guided  by  her 

likes  and  dislikes.    She  says  with  the  girl  in  the  ballad,  — 

"  The  reason  why  I  cannot  tell ; 
I  only  know  and  know  full  well, 
I  do  not  like  you,  Dr.  Fell." 


THE  CHOICE  OF  COMPANIONS.  I99 

I  have  never  been  able  to  find  fault  with  this  principle, 
though  I  hope  most  giris  are  not  drawn  together,  as 
some  are,  simply  because  their  sleeves  are  cut  alike. 
Even  if  we  all  looked  about  and  selected  the  most 
suitable  person  we  know  for  a  companion,  and  decided 
to  love  her  best,  do  you  think  we  should  succeed? 
The  fact  that  we  are  attracted  by  one  rather  than  an- 
other does  usually  mean  that  that  one  in  some  way 
belongs  to  us. 

The  better  we  are  ourselves,  the  more  likely  we  are 
to  love  the  good.  But  then,  suppose  we  are  not  very 
good,  and  we  are  conscious  that  our  friends  hinder  in- 
stead of  help  us?  What  are  we  to  do  if  we  are 
aware  that  we  are  very  easily  led  by  those  about  us? 
This  is  a  hard  question,  but  one  which  every  girl  must 
answer. 

I  do  not  believe  any  girl  is  so  unfortunate  as  not  to  find 
that  there  is  at  least  one  among  her  friends  who  helps 
her.  Let  her  cling  to  that  one,  if  to  no  other.  Or  if 
there  is  one  among  them  whom  she  knows  she  helps, 
she  must  be  sure  to  cling  to  that  one. 

But  what  can  be  done  about  the  friends  that  hinder? 
Is  n't  it  rather  selfish,  just  for  the  sake  of  our  own  im- 
provement, to  cast  off  those  who  love  us  ?  That  is  the 
way  many  generous  girls  feel,  though  they  may  not  like 
to  say  so  to  their  parents  or  their  teachers,  who  beg  them 
to  be  more  careful  of  their  associates. 


200     CHATS  WITH  GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

It  would  be  a  fine  thing  if  we  could  determine  not  to 
be  hindered ;  if  instead  of  that,  we  could  help  the  friend 
who  is  now  hindering  us.  Sometimes  that  is  possible. 
Suppose  we  have  already  chosen  our  friend  and  cannot 
give  her  up,  even  if  we  want  to  do  so,  without  causing 
her  pain.  We  are  in  no  such  dilemma  about  books.  We 
can  give  up  the  trash  we  have  been  reading  without 
hurting  anybody.  We  can  fortify  ourselves  with  the 
best  of  companions  in  books.  As  we  improve,  if  there 
is  anything  genuine  in  our  friendship,  our  friend  will  per- 
haps improve  with  us.  If  she  does  not,  the  bond  between 
us  will  grow  weaker  and  gradually  disappear  of  itself. 

But  alas  !  there  are  many  very  weak  girls  who  have 
not  decision  enough  to  try  such  a  remedy.  They  would 
be  good  girls  if  they  had  good  friends;  but  with  silly 
companions  they  are  very  silly  girls.  I  fear  there  is  no 
help  for  such  except  in  obeying  their  wiser  guardians. 
Any  girl  who  is  conscious  that  one  of  her  friends  is  lead- 
ing her  to  do  wrong  or  to  have  wrong  thoughts,  and  who 
knows  she  is  not  strong  enough  to  lead  instead  of  being 
led,  must  humbly  give  up  her  companion.  Suppose  she 
hurts  her  friend's  feelings.  It  may  rouse  the  one  who  is 
hurt  as  nothing  else  could  do. 

Occasionally  two  girls  at  boarding-school  who  know 
they  are  too  weak  to  help  each  other  will  talk  the  matter 
over  and  petition  not  to  be  allowed  to  room  together,  but 
to  be  put  with  wiser  room-mates.     In  the  end  they  love 


THE  CHOICE  OF  COMPANIONS.  201 

each  other  all  the  better  for  the  change  which  helps  both 
of  them  to  be  better  worth  loving. 

But  we  do  not  by  any  means  have  complete  choice  in 
the  matter  of  companions.  We  cannot  escape  associa- 
tion with  a  great  many  people  whom  we  do  not  even 
fancy.  For  this  reason  I  feel  like  insisting  all  the  more 
on  what  I  have  said  before,  —  that  we  must  use  all  our 
strength  to  rise  above  ourselves  without  the  help  of 
others.  We  must  be  our  best  whether  those  about  us 
are  their  best  or  not.  Perhaps  we  can  help  them  up ; 
at  all  events  we  must  not  let  them  drag  us  down.  If  we 
are  not  first  self-reliant,  I  am  afraid  we  shall  never  be  fit 
to  choose  any  companion.  And  we  ought  to  choose,  in 
spite  of  all  I  have  said  about  our  right  to  be  guided  by 
our  natural  likings ;  and  the  more  difficult  it  is  to  escape 
from  most  of  our  associates,  the  more  important  it  is  to 
choose  well  where  we  have  any  choice. 

The  one  law  is  to  choose  the  best.  But  who  are  the 
best,  —  those  who  minister  to  us  or  those  to  whom  we 
can  minister? 

I  know  a  woman  who  has  always  chosen  well.  She 
has  friends  in  all  parts  of  the  world  and  in  all  grades  of 
society.  If  I  tell  you  something  about  them  perhaps  it 
will  make  the  whole  subject  clearer. 

When  she  was  a  school-girl  she  was  naturally  attracted 
to  two  or  three  of  the  best  girls  in  her  class,  —  one  was 
the  best  scholar,  another   the   most   high-minded,   and 


202      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

another,  though  dull  enough,  was  the  neatest  and  sweet- 
est of  them  all.  She  cared  also  for  two  of  the  teachers,  — 
one  the  oldest  and  wisest,  the  other  the  youngest  and 
freshest  of  the  corps.  She  had  two  or  three  friends  also 
among  the  little  girls  whom  she  was  able  to  help.  She 
was  on  good  terms  with  almost  everybody  in  school,  and 
never  failed  in  courtesy  and  kindness ;  but  she  did  not 
make  sudden  or  intimate  friendships.  She  talked  freely 
perhaps  to  one  of  the  girls  and  to  one  of  the  teachers. 
When  she  left  school  and  went  back  to  her  home  in  the 
city,  she  was  at  once  surrounded  by  a  large  class  of  cul- 
tivated people.  She  liked  society,  and  went  to  parties 
when  she  had  time ;  but  the  special  friends  she  chose  for 
herself  were  not  those  who  shone  most  in  such  assemblies. 
One,  to  be  sure,  was  a  brilliant  society  woman,  the  most 
accomplished  and  most  beautifully  dressed  woman  of  the 
circle,  who  could  dance  all  night  and  be  as  fresh  as  a  rose 
in  the  morning,  and  whose  wit  and  grace  never  failed- 
Our  heroine  admired  this  woman  as  she  admired  all 
things  perfect  of  their  kind ;  but  she  never  would  have 
made  a  friend  of  her  if  she  had  not  seen  in  her  a  large, 
full,  unselfish  nature,  lifted  above  trivialities,  even  when 
she  was  doing  the  most  trivial  things. 

Another  of  her  friends  was  a  woman  then  studying 
medicine,  who  afterwards  became  a  physician  with  a 
world-wide  reputation ;  another  was  a  young  society 
fellow    whose    dominant    interest    in    Ufe   was   music; 


THE  CHOICE  OF  COMPANIONS.  203 

another  was  a  rich  young  lady  who  held  the  opinion  that 
a  woman  should  support  herself,  and  went  daily  to  her 
work  in  a  counting-room. 

In  the  meantime  her  interest  in  those  outside  her 
circle  was  increasing.  She  had  a  few  lessons  in  German 
from  a  shy  old  professor  very  much  out  at  the  elbows, 
who  had  such  a  power  of  inspiring  her  with  high  thoughts 
that  he  became  her  life-long  friend.  She  found  that  her 
milliner  was  a  cultivated  woman,  who  when  she  went  to 
Paris,  studied  the  pictures  of  the  Louvre  as  much  as  she 
did  the  fashions,  and  she  made  a  friend  of  her.  The 
newsboy  who  delivered  papers  at  the  door  proved  to 
have  a  real  taste  for  the  drama.  She  gave  him  substan- 
tial help  in  his  education ;  but  more  than  that,  she  was 
his  sympathetic  friend,  and  in  reading  Shakspeare  with 
him  she  received  as  much  help  as  she  gave. 

She  boarded  one  summer  in  a  fisherman's  home  on 
one  of  those  lonely  islands  along  the  coast  of  Maine,  and 
she  found  the  fisherman's  wife  a  true  companion,  a 
woman  not  only  of  sweetness  and  integrity,  but  a  thinker 
without  books,  and  one  who  saw  and  felt  the  glory  of 
the  world  without  requiring  an  artist  to  point  it  out 
to  her. 

At  the  South  she  came  in  contact  with  a  negro  woman 
who  had  been  a  slave,  and  whose  life  had  been  full  of 
those  terrible  tragedies  of  which  the  simplest  account 
makes  the  blood  run  cold.     This  woman  by  force  of 


204     CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

character  had  won  peace  out  of  suffering,  and  had  some- 
thing to  give  to  others  well  worth  giving. 

In  Austria  my  friend  met  a  charming  woman  in  a  rail- 
way train,  and  the  two  proved  to  have  so  many  points  of 
character  and  thought  in  common,  that  they  formed  a 
permanent  friendship.  This  new  acquaintance  turned 
out  to  be  a  countess. 

In  Italy  my  friend  found  a  young  girl  in  a  wretched 
hovel,  among  ignorant  peasants,  who  showed  such  natu- 
ral powers  that  it  seemed  worth  while  to  educate  her. 
My  friend  said  she  had  never  known  greater  refinement 
of  feeling  or  truer  poise  of  character  in  any  lady  of  the 
land. 

Now  why  did  this  one  woman  discover  these  remarka- 
ble people  everywhere  ?  The  rest  of  us  go  through  the 
world  and  think  our  companions  very  commonplace.  It 
was  because  she  had  those  qualities  in  herself  that  called 
out  a  response  from  the  best  in   others. 

"  The  pedigree  of  honey 

Does  not  concern  the  bee. 
A  clover  any  time  to  him 
Is  aristocracy." 

She  was  a  quiet,  rather  resen-ed  woman,  though  she  had 
an  easy  grace  in  conversation  which  always  pleased.  She 
cared  deeply  for  beauty  and  delicacy,  but  she  was  abso- 
lutely unworldly.  Nothing  attracted  her  which  was 
not   genuine,  and  she  had  a   nature   large   enough    to 


THE  CHOICE  OF  COMPANIONS.  205 

perceive  what  was  genuine  even  when  it  wore  an  uncouth 
disguise. 

We  ought  to  choose  the  best  companions.  But  is  it 
not  clear  that  even  the  weakest  girl  cannot  shield  her- 
self from  responsibility  by  saying  she  is  too  easily  led 
by  those  she  loves?  We  can  never  choose  our  friends 
aright  until  we  ourselves  become  worthy  of  worthy 
friends.  Oar  friends  do  help  us ;  but  we  have  no  right 
to  require  it  of  them,  and  no  right  to  be  a  drag  upon 
them.  We  must  learn  to  help  ourselves,  and  then  we 
can  in  turn  help  others,  and  be  fit  to  receive  help  from 
them. 

The  lady  I  have  been  describing  used  to  say,  "The 
happiest  friendships  are  not  those  where  we  take  every- 
thing or  give  everything,  but  where  we  both  give  and 
take.'' 


XIX. 

THE  MEANING  OF  OUR  CULTURE  TO 
OTHERS. 

HALF  a  century  ago,  the  girls  working  in  the  Lowell 
mills  gave  one  of  the  finest  examples  ever  seen 
of  "plain  living  and  high  thinking."  At  present  a  girl 
who  had  to  work  in  a  factory  from  twelve  years  old  to 
twenty  would  feel  herself  defrauded  of  culture.  But 
these  Lowell  girls  show  them  how  little  depends  on 
circumstances  and  how  much  on  themselves.  One  of 
these  girls  wore  out  Watts's  "  Improvement  of  the 
Mind  "  by  carrying  it  about  in  her  working-dress  pocket ; 
others  studied  German  in  the  evening,  though  their 
hours  of  labour  were  from  daylight  till  half  past  seven 
at  night ;  they  held  Improvement  Circles,  and  published 
a  magazine  or  two.  They  were  high-minded  and  re- 
fined, not  afraid  of  drudger)',  but  determined  to  make 
their  way  to  something  beyond  it.  Many  of  them  loved 
beauty  and  appreciated  the  sweep  of  the  fair  blue 
Merrimac  under  the  factory  windows.  In  their  homes, 
with  all  the  frugality,  the  atmosphere  was  fragrant  with 
peace  and  integrity. 

No  material  help  that  can  be  given  to  a  girl  forced  to 


MEANING   OF  OUR  CULTURE  TO   OTHERS.      207 

do  hard  work  can  equal  such  an  example.  Most  of  these 
factory  girls  succeeded  in  their  hopes.  They  earned 
their  education ;  they  became  teachers,  writers,  artists ; 
they  often  married  men  of  wealth  and  standing,  and 
many  of  them  now  hold  important  positions  in  society. 
Other  women  may  give  time  and  strength  and  money  to 
support  a  working-girls'  club ;  but  these  women  can  give 
something  far  better.  The  girls  only  need  to  look  at 
them  to  see  what  working-girls  may  become,  and  they  no 
longer  feel  that  they  have  any  right  to  despair  because 
their  conditions  are  hard. 

Miss  Lucy  Larcom,  in  her  exquisite  "New  England 
Girlhood,"  by  describing  her  own  life  in  the  Lowell  mills 
has  made  every  reader  feel  how  far-reaching  is  all  genuine 
culture,  though  perhaps  she  did  this  unconsciously.  Her 
frankness  in  speaking  of  this  life  puts  work  on  a  true  and 
dignified  basis,  and  furnishes  an  ideal  that  must  help 
every  girl  who  can  be  helped  by  anything. 

I  remember  a  delightful  young  teacher  in  a  boarding- 
school  who  had  a  love  for  beauty  that  was  like  a  sixth 
sense.  It  seemed  as  if  every  girl  in  school  caught  some 
glow  of  the  heavenly  flame  from  her,  though  she  simply 
went  her  way  unconscious  of  her  influence.  One  morn- 
ing she  looked  out  of  her  third-story  window  and  saw 
the  world  wrapped  in  snow.  The  storm  had  ceased,  but 
the  paths  were  yet  unbroken.  She  thought  of  the  beauty 
of  the  woods  that  encircled  the  town,  and  it  seemed  to 


208      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

her  necessary  that  everybody  should  see  it.     She  said  so 
to  the  principal  of  the  school  when  they  met  at  break- 
fast, and  suggested  that  lessons  should  be  given  up  for  the 
morning.     The   principal   smiled   thoughtfully.     It  had 
not  occurred  to  her  that  the  lessons  could  be  given  up ; 
but  she  was  a  woman  of  large  mind,  and  she  saw  at  once 
that  a  sleigh-ride  through  those  wonderful  forest  aisles 
would  do  more  to  elevate  the  girls  than  anything  they 
could  leam  from  books.     A  lovely  pale  light  was  break- 
ing through  the  clouds  and  touching  the  arches  of  the 
elms  as  the  happy  party  set  off.     There  was  plenty  of 
fun  during  the  morning,  and  yet  this  penetrating  into  the 
beautiful  mystery  of  the  untouched  sanctuary  of  the  snow 
was  as  a  consecration  to  these  light-hearted  girls.     They 
came  home  quietly,  and  studied   faithfully  through  the 
short    winter   afternoon.      And   they   never   forgot   the 
vision.       I    do    not  suppose   that  the   teacher  had  any 
thought  of  doing  good.     She  acted  from  the  impulse  of 
a  nature  so  in  harmony  with  beauty  that  she  felt  instinct- 
ively that  the  moment  had  come  to  look  beyond  books 
at  a  revelation  of  the  divine.    Yet  it  would  hardly  be  too 
much  to  say  that  every  girl  in  school  was  more  sensitive 
to  beauty  all  her  life  for  what  many  people  would   have 
considered  that  unreasonable  holiday.     We  must  indeed 
try  to  help  others  directly,  and  yet  the  best  help  of  all 
always  comes  to  them  not  from  what  we  do  or  say  but 
from  what  we  arc. 


MEANING  OF  OUR  CULTURE  TO  OTHERS.     209 

"  How  will  you  endure  life  in  that  stupid  little  place?  " 
asked  one  young  lady  about  to  graduate  from  college  of 
a  classmate  whose  family  ties  made  it  necessary  for  her 
to  settle  down  in  a  small  village  ;  "  you  will  not  have  one 
companion  of  your  own  age."  "Oh,"  said  the  other, 
serenely,  "  I  have  plenty  of  old  friends  there,  and  it 
would  be  a  pity  if  my  education  was  of  no  use  to  them. 
I  mean  to  start  a  reading-circle,  and  a  natural  history 
club,  and  a  class  for  art  study,  and  one  thing  and 
another." 

"In  other  words,  you  mean  to  teach  your  acquaint- 
ances," said  her  friend,  rather  scornfully. 

"  I  '11  teach  them  what  I  can,"  replied  the  other,  cheer- 
fully. "  Of  course  I  ought  to  do  that,  after  having  had  a 
chance  to  learn ;  but  you  don't  realize  how  bright  those 
young  people  are  1  If  we  read  Shakspeare  together,  for 
instance,  I  shall  know  most  of  what  the  critics  think,  but 
I  dare  say  they  will  make  more  original  suggestions  than 
I  shall." 

"Then  you  don't  mean  to  do  missionary  work,  after 
all." 

"  No,  indeed ;  but  I  don't  mean  to  rust  out.  I  want 
to  enjoy  myself  and  I  want  to  go  on  with  my  education ; 
and  that  is  what  the  others  want,  too,  though  they  have 
not  been  so  fortunate  as  I  have.  We  shall  help  each 
other." 

It  seems  to  me  that  this  young  lady  was  more  generous 
14 


210     CHATS  WITH   GIRLS  ON  SELF-CULTURE. 

than  if  she  had  definitely  proposed  to  do  missionary 
work  among  her  uncultivated  friends,  for  she  was  more 
humble  and  less  self-conscious.  No  one  can  doubt  that 
her  companions  themselves  would  approve  of  her  spirit, 
or  that  she  would  accomplish  more  than  if  she  had 
looked  down  upon  them  from  a  height. 

If  we  rise,  we  must  take  others  with  us,  instead  of  shak- 
ing ourselves  loose  from  them.  Otherwise  there  can 
be  no  real  elevation  of  character.  Even  intellectually 
the  contact  with  minds  differently  trained  from  our  own 
is  an  advantage.  We  discover  what  is  real  and  what 
is  merely  traditional  in  our  culture. 

In  America,  at  least,  there  are  always  to  be  found 
two  or  three  people  in  every  country  town  far  more 
highly  cultivated  than  the  rest.  It  is  sometimes  rather 
hard  for  them  to  overlook  the  differences  between 
themselves  and  those  around  them.  They  are  shocked 
at  the  want  of  refinement  they  see  everywhere.  They  are 
tired  of  village  gossip.  So  they  sigh  for  more  con- 
genial society.  Now,  while  it  is  true  that  a  friend  or 
two  of  their  own  degree  of  culture  would  be  a  means 
of  great  happiness  and  refreshment  to  them,  it  is  not 
true  that  their  lives  may  not  be  full  of  interest  and  in- 
spiration. The  people  talk  gossip  because  nothing  else 
is  provided  for  them  to  talk  about.  Surely  an  edu- 
cated woman  ought  to  be  clever  enough  to  introduce 
some  higher  subject   of  conversation  which  would  not 


MEANING  OF  OUR  CULTURE  TO  OTHERS.   211 

be  beyond  the  range  of  the  company.  If  the  young 
graduate  I  have  quoted  carried  out  her  plans,  it  is 
easy  to  see  that  in  her  circle  at  least  there  would  be 
new  topics  for  discussion,  and  every  member  of  every 
one  of  her  clubs  ought  to  be  a  new  centre  for  healthful 
development.  Twenty  families  might  easily  get  an  im- 
pulse from  her  unpretending  resolution  not  to  rust  out. 

As  for  refinement,  that  grows  gradually  by  contact 
with  the  refined.  Now,  suppose  all  the  refined  people 
could  shut  themselves  up  in  a  beautiful  garden  hidden 
from  the  rest  of  the  world  by  a  high  fence,  would  it  show 
that  they  loved  refinement,  or  simply  that  they  loved 
themselves?  If  they  really  loved  refinement,  I  think 
they  would  not  be  satisfied  without  scattering  its  seeds 
far  and  wide. 

So  it  is  with  the  things  of  the  intellect.  What  is  their 
charm  for  us?  Ought  it  not  to  be  the  delight  of  con- 
stantly finding  out  more  and  more  of  truth  and  beauty? 
If  it  is  so  then  how  can  we  be  contented  without  show- 
ing the  vision  to  everybody  who  is  willing  to  look  at  it  ? 
If  we  alone  have  climbed  to  the  hilltop  whence  we  may 
see  the  rising  sun,  how  strange  that  we  should  waste  a 
moment  in  regretting  that  we  are  alone  when  we  might 
be  cheerfully  calling  to  those  groping  in  the  darkness 
below  to  come  up  to  us  !  Suppose  we  should  stand  on 
the  summit,  and  instead  of  fixing  our  eyes  on  the  sun- 
rise, should  look  down  in  scorn  on  our  old  companions 


212      CHATS  WITH   GIRLS   ON   SELF-CULTURE. 

at  the  base  of  the  mountain.  Suppose  we  spent  our 
time  in  admiring  our  own  strength  and  swiftness,  and 
began  to  be  jealous  the  moment  we  saw  a  fellow-traveller 
approaching  !  What  would  the  sunrise  be  to  us  ?  It  is 
not  those  who  love  the  things  of  the  intellect  who  fail  to 
love  their  neighbour,  —  it  is  those  who  love  themselves. 
In  these  days  when  we  have  so  many  opportunities  to 
take  a  broad  glance  at  the  world,  when  we  are  oppressed 
and  overwhelmed  at  the  thought  of  the  poverty  and  misery 
of  so  many  of  our  fellow-creatures,  most  educated  girls 
long  to  do  something  to  raise  the  poor  and  ignorant. 
They  are  ready,  if  need  be,  to  live  in  the  midst  of  the 
slums  in  the  hope  of  giving  cheer  to  the  suffering,  and 
of  furnishing  an  ideal  to  the  low.  This  is  well.  But  all 
cannot  do  the  same  work.  Many  a  girl  feels  herself 
stranded  for  a  time  at  least  among  merely  commonplace 
people.  Every  one  who  cultivates  herself  finds  herself 
raised  above  some  of  her  old  associates.  This  is  as  true 
of  the  rich  as  of  the  poor.  Such  a  girl  fancies  she  has 
nothing  in  common  with  those  about  her,  and  that  she 
can  do  nothing  for  them.  Both  fancies  are  false.  Prob- 
ably her  great  opportunity  has  come  to  her,  and  she  does 
not  see  it.  If  she  were  not  so  certain  of  her  superiority 
to  her  companions,  and  would  meet  them  simply,  giving 
them  her  best,  or  at  least  the  best  they  would  take,  she 
would  soon  see  they  were  not  so  commonplace  as  she 
had  thought,  and  they  would  find  themselves  lifted  above 


MEANING  OF  OUR  CULTURE  TO  OTHERS.      213 

their  ordinary  plane.  Generally  it  will  be  found  that 
everybody  is  ready  for  our  best,  however  they  may  slight 
and  deride  our  second  best. 

Our  culture  has  a  meaning  to  our  dear  friends,  to  those 
whom  we  regard  as  our  equals  and  most  delightful  com- 
panions, and  to  those  whom  we  love  and  reverence  as 
far  above  us.  The  touch  of  a  friendly  hand  often  holds 
us  on  a  high  level  when  if  our  friend  wavered,  we  should 
sink  with  her.  Often  two  girls  find  great  enjoyment  in 
pursuing  grand  studies  together  when  either  alone  would 
drift  with  the  current  and  fritter  away  the  day  in  triviali- 
ties. You  can  all  think  of  some  friend,  no  wiser  in  books 
than  you  are,  who  has  helped  you  unspeakably  by  her 
fine  ideals.  And  do  you  not  also  know  some  one  you 
count  inferior  —  perhaps  some  child  —  who  has  forced 
you  to  be  your  best  by  loving  what  is  best  in  you  ?  Then 
you  can  see  how  you  too  may  help  those  you  honour. 

Self-culture  is  not  selfish.  It  is  a  duty  and  it  is  a  well- 
spring  of  happiness  within  the  heart.  One  who  has 
true  culture  is  a  radiant  point  from  which  beams  of  light 
flow  out,  shedding  a  blessing  on  the  world. 


THE  END. 


